CASUAL PAPERS 



UPON THE 




AND 



^KINDRED QUESTIONS AND, INCIDENTALLY, 



UPON 



published in the Honghong Daily Press, 18G2-G5.y 



SECOND EDITION, 




^ ,4 



4 

'OK) 



PAPERS ON THE AMERICAN QUESTION. 



% portion of sontf 
flfa^ual ®rtjgmal fapra 

upon the American Question in 1862-63, reprinted to accom- 
pany the series of 1864, and with reference to the series of 
republications by IE. P. U. closed on the 25th April 1863. 



To the Editor of the " Daily Press" Honykony. 

Mr. Editor. — The correspondents of the Times and some 
other journals have not been content, latterly, to paint actual 
scenes of the war in America with a dark pencil, unrelieved as 
these seem to be in their eyes by the devoted valor and sublime 
fortitude of the combatants ; — but have attempted the prefigure- 
ment of a state of anarchy at the North as portending the failure 
of its cause, if not the utter wreck of Republican Institutions. 

Let us not acquiesce in the hasty assumptions of the sensation 
Press of either country upon this or any other occasion; but sift 
the evidence well, lest in so much chaff as is constantly offered us 
we lose sight of the truth. 

Here is the best of testimony per contra ; upon the point in 
question, extracted as it is from the very journal cited by the 
" Times " correspondent in support of his prophecy, the New York 
" World." 

Extracted from the " World" of 19th Sept. 

" The Springfield Republican puts its heel upon some nonsense 
recently rampant thus : 

" As for this talk about anarchy and military dictators, it is 
miserable drivel. It is a disgrace to the press and to all who read 
it with any other feeling than contempt. There is not in the 



2 



PAPERS ON THE 



army, nor among the people, the slightest basis upon which to 
raise any such apprehension. The general who should dream of 
such a thing would show himself an idiot, with no sort of appre- 
ciation of the character of the American people — and the army is 
only a portion of the people. We are not on the verge of national 
destruction at all — we are nowhere in the neighborhood of anarchy 
or military usurpation. We are a strong, self-poised people, who 
comprehend the great work that has been assigned us, and are 
gathering up our strength for a final grasp at this monstrous re- 
bellion, which, by God's grace, will throttle it and lay it out stark. 
That's the plain fact about it." 

I am, Your subscriber. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, 29th November, 1862. 

Editorial of July, 1863. 

We have been accused more than once of Confederate pro- 
clivities, and of a disposition to exclude from our columns, notices 
favorable to the Federal cause. We have more than once denied 
this charge, and as a set off to those who have made it, we shall 
feel obliged by the loan or gift of a copy of the address which Mr. 
W. B. Reed, who was a few years since United States Minister to 
China, made to a meeting in Philadelphia on the 29th March last. 
This address was republished in London under the title of " A 
Northern Plea for Peace," but we cannot procure a copy of it. 

We have been favored with copies of a series of very able 
papers republished in China, on the subject of the conflict in the 
United States : and although we freely admit that Jogic and calm 
argument were relied upon by the amateur publisher in dissemin- 
ating his views, still it cannot be denied that he deemed the cause 
of the North, the cause of right and liberty, and he took matters 
for granted accordingly. If he were unbiassed, impartial and 
unprejudiced, why should this address of Mr. Reed's be excluded 
from his very valuable series of papers ? Mr. Ward, a Southerner 
also an ex-Minister to China, denounced the separation of the 
Union and the course adopted by the South. His opinions were 



M /fee- 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



put foward with much parade and emphasis amongst the publish- 
ed series we have alluded to and why we ask, should this address 
of Mr. Reed be excluded ? 

We understand that the latter has attracted much attention 
in London. Mr. Reed denounces the war, as well as the mode 
adopted of carrying it on. He protests against the invasion of 
States rights, the unscrupulous lawlessness of some of the military 
leaders, and most especially against the employment of negro 
troops with the view of creating an insurrection of the slaves. 
The address when delivered was warmly applauded by a large and 
respectable audience, and was deemed a good exponent of the 
state of public opinion in Philadelphia. 



Editorial of the " Bail?/ Press." 

In our fourth page will be found a letter from our esteemed 
correspondent E. P. U. affixing and commenting on Mr. Seward's 
balcony speech to the seneraders whose ebbullition of feeling 
caused them to embody their sentimental congratulations for the 
drawn battle of Gettysburgh, in the shape of a midnight prank. 

Our valued correspondent has never yet given us his views 
on Mr. Reed's speech at Philadelphia. We do not approve of the 
views of either the Times or the Saturday Review on American 
affairs, on the contrary we like both sides of the question. 

To the Editor of the " Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor — Below is the speech of Mr. SeAvard which 
has given so much zest to the last feast of reason prepared by the 
always-vigilant Jackalls of the British Lion ; and it may help the 
readers of your quotations from the Times and Saturday Review to 
digest the truth and arrive at the pith of the matter : — 

For assuredly the Secretary of State, called out of his bed at 
midnight, has neither in matter or manner made himself amenable 
to the bitter taunts of his domestic or foreign enemies, the latter 
of whom have so far abased themselves as to borrow epithets of 
the former, inspired by party malevolence and private spite. — Your 
Subscriber. 



E. P. U. 



4 



PAPERS ON THE 



Editorial of the "Daily Press." 

Below will be found our valued correspondent, E. P. U's 
rejoinder to our thrice repeated suggestion that the public expected 
from him a review of Mr. Reed's celebrated speech at Philadelphia. 
Our Correspondent has begged the question. We are no admirer 
of Mr. Reed — yet as our Saviour on the Mount entertained and 
rebutted all the arguments advanced by Satan, so should our 
correspondent deal with those points of Mr. Reed's speech which 
excited such lively interest in London, even were Mr. Reed many 
times worse than he is. 

The peculiar task which E. P. U. undertook, was self-imposed. 
He appeared to profess to cover all the vast ground of the question 
he opened, and he displayed an amount of tact and acumen, 
which made his arguments impressive to a degree. He appeared 
fully in earnest, yet he seemed to be so entirely guided by truth 
and logic, that he managed to throw a mantle over partisanship, 
which, while his style might impart to some the idea of lukewarm- 
ness, yet it could not fail to impress the general reader with a 
feeling that veracity and impartiality dictated the aspirations so 
ably deduced. 

The plea regarding dates now put forward, we were not 
previously aware of. We thought we detected a hiatus in our 
correspondent's able effusions. He handled skilfully and ably all 
the notices on the subject of the right of secession which proved 
worthy of European celebrity, — at least in-so-far as they came to 
our notice, except this speech of Mr. Reed, which we do call upon 
him in the name of the public to review. Mr. Ward who was U. 
S. Minister here, came from Georgia — he condemned Secession, 
and E. P. U. made a great card of his having done so. Mr. Reed 
who preceded Mr. Ward as U. S. Minister to China, came from 
Pennsylvania, — he upholds Secession. The report of his speech 
was so widely circulated that E. P. U. can easily obtain a copy. 
We beg of him to review it. We perused it and it shook E. P. 
U's. arguments in our mind, terribly. 

To the Editor of the " Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor. — I hasten to point out that a great disservice 
has been done me in the misprinting of a portion of my letter in 
your issue of the 2nd instant, wherein I wrote, " the always- 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



5 



vigilant Jackalls of the British Lion ; " whereas I am made to 
say, " the low vigilant Jackalls of the British Lion." 

As to responding to your repeated appeals to me to admit 
the pertinence and force of certain strictures of Mr. W. B. Reed 
upon the War in the United States, — I should so much regret a 
misinterpretation of my seeming hesitation to accept your challenge, 
that I am constrained to evade it no longer, although I am 
violating a sense of reserve imposed by my own inclinations. 

Permit me, then, first to meet the point of jour remarks 
wherein you imputed to me — (in your editorial of July) — an 
intentional withholding of the speech of Mr. Reed of March 29th 
last at Philadelphia from the series of papers circulated by me, 
upon which you were then commenting. 

Why — Mr. Editor, the latest issue of those Papers was in 
April, — the Resume which covered the last being dated April 
25th ; so that in very point of time your imputation became 
pointless : Neither had I seen the speech, in July ; nor have I 
yet seen it. 

But, Secondly, as to the claim of Mr. Reed to be heard in 
any matter requiring dispassionate and unselfish treatment, I 
should be stating no new opinion of my own in denying such 
claim ; and I consider it as somewhat strange that I should be 
challenged to this expression of it by yourself, since you were not 
sparing of strictures upon his diplomatic career in China. 

My distrust of him was intimated in a review of his speech 
at Philadelphia before leaving for China, in the Hongkong Magazine 
of September 1857 ; and this distrust was fully confirmed by his 
career, as well as by the labored and vainglorious accounts of his 
stewardship which he gave. These, also, were reviewed by me as 
exhibiting a gratuitous unfriendliness toward England ; and that 
any Englishman should still look to Mr. Reed for an unbiassed or 
reliable opinion upon a question wherein his own ambition has 
been chastened, is surprising. 

That his own countrymen have full warrant for their distrust 
of his loyalty, it will suffice, at present, to quote here a Resolution 
of which he declares himself the sole author, and which was offered 
at a meeting of Democrats in Philadelphia on the 17th of January 
1861, which is in these words ; and I beg you to note the insidious 
appeal in them to local and State pride, prejudice and material 
advantages : 



6 



PAPERS ON THE 



" Resolved, That in the deliberate judgment of the Democracy 
"of Philadelphia, and, so far as we know it, of Pennsylvania, the 
" dissolution of the Union, by the separation of the whole South 
" — a result we shall most sincerely deplore — may release this 
" Commonwealth from the bonds which now connect it with the 
" Confederacy, and would authorize and require its Citizens, 
"through a Convention, to be assembled for that purpose, to 
" determine with whom their lot shall be cast ; whether with the 
" North and East, whose fanaticism has precipitated this misery 
" upon us, or with our Brethren of the South, whose wrongs we 
" feel as our own ; or whether Pennsylvania shall stand by herself, 
"ready, when occasion offers, to bind together the broken Union, 
"and resume her place of loyalty and devotion." — I am, Your 
Subscriber. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, 3rd October 1863. 



Macao, October 2Uh, 1863. 

Mr. Editor, 

By lack of statesmanship in England, America, — that was 
pre-eminently a commercial Nation,— is forced to become a warlike 
one ; and the unnatural Mother, who intensifies the strife of her 
children, feels the retributive sting of the arrows in her own vitals. 

Let us be hopeful that these sad lessons of our day will be 
heeded now and kept in remembrance hereafter ; — that the World- 
wide strife which seems impending may be averted and the future 
intercourse of the two Nations conserve the natural affection that 
is at the bottom of the great heart of the two Peoples. 

To express a hope, as you did recently, that the fitting-out 
of war vessels in England for the Confederates may be stopped 
by the Government, is but to declare for peace between our two 
Nations; and it is reassuring to perceive that the "Times" has, 
at length, dried its crocodile tears sufficiently to perceive the 
danger of its course of inculcation, especially in respect to this 
paramount matter of the moment. 

But, whilst it is satisfactory to note its change of both tone 
and tenor in the later expositions of the subject, the want of com- 
pleteness in its citation of authorities upon public Law is less so. 



ALABAMA AND HER COMMANDER. 



7 



111 view of this, I am fortunate in receiving by the last mail, 
a contribution upon this very point from the pen of one of the 
highest legal authorities in America, — Professor Parsons of Harvard 
University, shewing that the citations in the case of the Alexandra 
were very partial, and pointing out most lucidly that the case of 
the " Gran Para " or " Irresistible " properly rules these cases. * 



(Published in the Hoiujlcotuj Daily Press, and reprinted, owing to errors of the press.) 



The Friend of India of October 29th speaks as follows of the 
Alabama and her Commander Semmes. 

" The Madras Athenceum, in a very sensible article on the 
" Alabama, apropos of her possible appearance in those seas, puts 
" Captain Semmes in his proper position and dubs him, pirate. — 
" To all intents and purposes a pirate he is, and should he appear 
" at Madras is not likely to be received with that distinction which 
" met him at the Cape of Good Hope. A remarkable feature in 
"this American War is the sympathy which we as a people have 
" all along shewn to the Southern cause. Enemies of Slavery, we 
" have constantly patted a would-be gigantic Slave Power on the 
"back, and men like Semmes who go fillibustering all round the 
" globe, are put into our gallery of heroes. A curious inconsis- 
tency." 



We have received the above from a valued correspondent, 
and we insert it accordingly. Considering the dreadful condition 
into which the United States are plunged by the present disastrous 



E. P. U. 





Editorial of ike " Daily Press." 



* Note. — The exposition of Professor Parsons and the Speech of the Secretary of State are omitted 
in this reprint as superfluous, from their having been widely published in America. 

E. P. U. 



8 



PAPERS ON THE 



war, we can so far sympathise with a Northerner as to respect any 
opinions he may express, no matter how violent and ultra they 
may appear. But we look upon an unprejudiced man who main- 
tains that Captain Semmes is a pirate, as a goose, and neither 
capable of arguing, nor worthy of being argued with. 

The Confederate States unquestionably form a belligerent 
power — that even the Federal government admit, in the exchange 
of prisoners, and in the principles which guide their law courts. 
There is not the slightest occasion, for the purposes of our argu- 
ment, to enter on the merits of the quarrel — suffice it to say, the 
fact is indisputable, and is admitted by the Federal government, 
that the Confederate States are a belligerent power. 

Such being the case, the right of either belligerent to prey 
on the commerce of the other is undoubted. The Federals have 
blockaded the Confederate ports, and are continually seizing and 
confiscating neutral vessels in attempting to break the blockade ; 
the Confederates having no port open wherein to take their prizes, 
adjudicate upon them at the capstan head, and instead of selling 
them as lawful prizes, burn them. The charge of piracy therefore 
resolves itself into this. Federal seizures are adjudicated on by a 
court of law, whilst Confederate seizures are not. We have not 
seen the charge of piracy against the Confederate cruizers defined, 
and the construction we have placed on it appears to us far more 
tangible than anything we have seen expressed. 

Now this charge will not stand investigation. The Confederate 
Government desire to be acknowledged by all civilised States, 
and holding themselves responsible for the acts of their cruizers, 
have sent envoys to the great European powers, to urge acknow- 
ledgment of their independence and to be properly represented. 
If one of their cruizers should destroy a vessel belonging to a 
neutral power, they extend every facility to enable such claims to 
be made. No such claims have ever arisen except in the case of 
a suit established against the Florida, at Brest. 

But there is another consideration. Retaliation in war, is 
perfectly right and regular. Will any one argue that the Federal 
government have the right to invade the Southern States, to do 
their utmost to cause a servile war ; to burn down towns wantonly, 
as they did Jackson ; to pour Greek fire into cities as they did 
into Charleston ; to commit the cruelties on women which General 
Butler did in New Orleans ; in point of fact, to sink, burn and 



ALABAMA AND HER COMMANDER. 



9 



destroy by fire and sword, and yet deny the South the right to 
retaliate ? 

It might be as well argued that the law is cruel, because it 
provides that evil doers shall be punished. For, as the law pun- 
ishes evil doers as an example and a terror to the evil disposed, so 
does Captain Semmes destroy all the Federal ships he meets, to 
the end that American Commerce may be swept from the seas. 
-He has destroyed about sixty ships, and has prevented perhaps 
six thousand from going to sea. He has observed all national 
amenities, and local regulations — he has not appropriated, to our 
knowledge, any of the property which he has seized to himself. 
He is the faithful servant of a belligerent power, Avhose cause he 
espouses with zeal, patriotism, energy, talent, and fidelity. His 
object is to sweep American Commerce from the seas, and wonder- 
fully has he succeded in deeply injuring the enemy of his country ; 
yfchis ship is in perfect discipline — a pattern of a war vessel. 
He is undoubtedly, next to Garibaldi, the hero of the day. He 
is a patriot, a gentleman, and a great sea captain. Abraham 
Lincoln calls him a pirate, as Pio Nono, calls Garibaldi a brigand. 
One charge is as true as the other. 

The parties interested in the vessels which Captain Semmes 
destroys are doubtless entitled to every sympathy ; but then it 
must be remembered that they knew precisely the risk they ran 
when they embarked on the voyages which proved so disastrous 
to them. If Captain Semmes were to let them pass unmolested, 
he would betray his trust and would not snuff out, as his daring 
acts have tended to do, the commerce of the United States. 

Still, it ill becomes an English community to feast and fete 
him, as the denizens of Cape Town did. He preys on the com- 
merce of a people who are nigh akin to us in blood, and who speak 
our language — a people who may have a plenitude of demagogues 
amongst them, with slack jaws, foul tongues, and chaotic ideas of 
liberty, but who still nevertheless, are in civilization, in the arts 
and sciences, in Christianity and in progress, our fellows and our 
equals. If we do not espouse their cause, let us leave them to 
work out their own redemption and their destiny, and not fete 
and applaud the ubiquitous destroyer of their commerce, however 
much we may admire his tact, courage, and determination. 

(Issue of January 14.) 



10 



PAPERS ON THE 



To the Editor of the " Hongkong Daily Press." 

Macao, \5th January, 1864. 

Mr. Editor. — Your issue of yesterday, which has just reached 
me, reproduces a brief editorial of the Friend of India, comment- 
ing approvingly upon one in the Madras Jthenceum wherein the 
commander of the Alabama is " put in his proper position and 
dubbed a pirate ; " and I observe that you so far take exception 
to this characterization as to apply the contemptuous epithet of 
" goose " to those two contemporaries, — than whom none east of 
the Cape occupy a higher moral position. 

As I sent you the editorial in question without comment of 
my own, and withheld from it the responsibility of my present nom 
de plume, I might rightly be absolved altogether from noticing the 
lapse from editorial decorum in the pen you wielded on this occa- 
sion ; and certainly your amiable ignoring of the maxim that 
" sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander," by excluding 
myself and my fellow citizens of the Northern States from the 
category of the former, induces me to attribute the aberration to 
some infusion of the nature of the " quill," rather than to a 
continuity of thought in the wielder of it. 

But, Mr. Editor, we will bandy neither compliments or 
epithets, for the personal is lost in the national, — the individual 
among the many, — in the grave circumstances of the present time ; 
nor can we claim to be representative men. We may feel impelled 
to speak or to write : but we must be quite conscious that what 
we say is fragmentary and inconclusive. We remember, indeed, 
that the cackle of geese once saved Rome ; and may content our- 
selves to draw thence the hope of attracting the attention of the 
real guardians of the People. 

I say the People, for the question that you discuss as one of 
feeling and passion, — as between two belligerents and mere 
observers, — is one of principles, underlying the welfare of Peoples, 
and of universal concernment ; in short, the question of civilization 
itself. — And it is because your remarks upon it betray the want 
of a precise knowledge of facts, and denote, as I think, a halting 
regard of these principles, along with some concessions to latent 
prejudices or morbid sympathies, that I attempt a reply to them : 
Rather, I shall attempt a marshalling of facts and considerations 



ALABAMA AND HER COMMANDER. 



11 



pertaining to the question, instead of a reply in the sense of individual 
opinion. 

1. As to the facts of the origin and career af the "Alabama " 
as constituting her a lawful Ocean belligerent, or the contrary. 

As obviously the question is to be viewed in the light of, and 
discussed in the sense of the latest authentic manifestation of the 
common accord of all the civilized States, I will thank you to insert 
at this point, — as moreover of great interest in itself as well as of 
pertinence in the immediate question, — the following record of the 
result of the negotiation upon the questions of Public Law, 
embodied in the Declarateon of the 16th April, 1856, by the Con- 
gress of Paris. 

Pointing specially to article 3, in passing, I reserve further 
matter, lest I overrun the space of one of your issues. — 

E. P. U. 

ABOLITION OF PRIVATEERING, &c. 

(Translated from the Paris Moniteur of July 14//<, 18 58. J 
Memorandum to the Emperor. 

Sire. — Your Majesty will deign to remember that the powers 
which signed the declaration of the 16th April, 1856, pledged 
themselves to take steps to render the adoption thereof general. 
I have, therefore, hastened to communicate this declaration to all 
the governments which were not represented in the congress of 
Paris, inviting them in the meantime to accede to it ; and I now 
have the honor to inform the Emperor of the favorable reception 
which the communication has met with. 

Adopted and ratified by the plenipotentiaries of Austria, 
France, Great Britain, Russia, Prussia, Sardinia, and Turkey, the 
declaration of the 16th of April has received the full adhesion of 
the following powers : — Baden, Bavaria, Belgium, Bremen, Brazil, 
Duchy of Brunswick, Chile, The Argentine Confederation, The 
Germanic Confederation, Denmark, The Two Sicilies, Ecuador, 
The Roman States, Greece, Guatemala, Lubeck, Mecklenburg- 
Strelitz, Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Nassau, Oldenburg, Parma, The 
Netherlands, Peru, Portugal, Saxony, Saxe-Alterburg, Saxe- 
Couburg-Gotha, Saxe-Meiningen, Saxe-Weimar, Sweden, Hayti, 



12 



PAPERS ON THE 



Hamburg, Hanover, The Two Hesses, Switzerland, Tuscany, 
Wurtemburg. 

The above-named governments acknowledge, then, with 
France and the other powers, signers of the treaty of Paris. — 

1. That privateering is, and remains, abolished. 

2. That the neutral flag covers the cargo of the enemy, except 
when it is contraband of War. 

3. That neutral goods, except contraband of War, are not 
seizable under the enemy's flag. 

4. Finally, that blockades, to be obligatory, are to be effective 
— that is to say, maintained by a sufficient force to shut out the 
access of the enemy's ships and other vessels in reality. 

The government of Uruguay has also given its entire assent 
to these four principles, except its ratification by the Legislature. 

Spain, without acceding to the declaration of the 16th of 
April, on account of the first article concerning the abolition of 
privateering, has answered that she appropriated the three others 
as her own. Mexico has given the same answer. 

The United States would also be ready to grant their adhesion 
if it were added to the enunciation of the abolition of privateering 
that the private property of citizens, subjects of the belligerent 
powers, would be free from seizure at sea from the War navies 
respectively. 

Save these exceptions, all the cabinets have adhered without 
reserve to the four principles constituting the declaration of the 
congress of Paris ; and thus, in the international law of nearly all the 
States of Europe and America, a progress is declared to which the 
government of your Majesty, following one of the most honorable 
traditions of French policy, may congratulate itself to have power- 
fully contributed. 

In order to authenticate these adhesions, I propose to the 
Emperor to authorize the insertion, in the Bulletin des Lois, of the 
official notes in which these adhesions are consigned ; and if your 
Majesty agrees to that proposition, I will publish in the same 
manner the accessions which may reach me subsequently. 

I am, with respect, Sire, of your Majesty the most obedient 
Servant and true subject. — 

WALEWSKI. 
Approved, NAPOLEON, the 1.2th June, 1858. 



ALABAMA AND HER COMMANDER. 



13 



(From the "Daily Press" of January 22nd, 1864 J 
THE "ALABAMA." 
Part 2. 

What, then, is her history and what are the considerations 
which deprive her of a proper character of Ocean helligerency ? 

First. — She was built in defiance of Public Law, and in 
contravention of the Special Statutes of England, at Birkenhead ; 
whence she was surreptitiously taken to Sea, but a few hours 
before the telegraphic order to seize her reached Liverpool. 

She thus escaped without either a Register or Port-clearance, 
and known only as vessel No. 290, from the building yard of 
Laird and Son. 

Too late in recognizing her unlawful character, (owing it is 
stated to the illness of legal advisers,) although Mr. Collier (now 
Her Majesty's Solicitor General) had pointed it out, and which 
was only too surely betrayed by her sudden departure in disguise 
and without documents, Her Majesty's Ministers strove to intercept 
her by sending orders for her seizure to Queenstown and Nassau ; 
but she avoided those ports. 

And thereafter, it required only that she should receive her 
crew and her armament and stores, to constitute her the lawless 
Sea Rover that she has notoriously become ; — the pre-requisite of 
visiting a port of the so-called Confederacy, in order that her 
inchoate character should be determined, and an assumed legality 
be conferred upon her subsequent career by the Rebel Authorities, 
never having been complied with, although she made an attempt 
to enter the port of Galveston in Texas : — In this respect her status 
being, thus, left unlike the " Florida's," which succeeded in 
entering the port of Mobile. 

Conceived and built, as we see she was, in violation of the 
Laws of Nations, the Statutes of England and the Proclamation of 
the Queen, and wanting all color of legality, this vessel was con- 
ducted off Point Lynas where another steamer was awaiting her 
with a portion of her crew and stores, and thence she proceeded 
to Terceira, one of the Azores, belonging to Portugal. There she 
was joined by the British Vessel Agrippina, which had brought 
from England the principal part of her Guns and Stores. While 
transhipping these, the Portuguese Authorities interfered to prevent 
such an abuse of a neutral port ; but were disregarded, and falsely 



14 



PAPERS ON THE 



told that the Alabama was merely relieving the other vessel because 
she was sinking. Soon after, however, the British Steamer Bahama 
arrived direct from Liverpool, whence she had been cleared as for 
Nassau, with Raphael Semmes and about fifty additional men, and 
the residue of the Guns and Stores. Then the Portuguese Autho- 
rities ordered them all off. They finally complied so far as to go 
to another part of the coast of the Island, where they completed 
the transhipment, in defiance of the Sovereignty of Portugal. 
There, too, Raphael Semmes took command of the Alabama and 
hoisted the Rebel flag on her, in place of the Ensign of England, 
which had been flying over her before ; read his commission ; and 
started on his course of license and spoliation. 

We see, therefore, in what a spirit of audacity the Authorities 
of both England and Portugal were disregarded in the three first 
stages of the Alabama s career ; — that, if I may use an expressive 
figure of speech to typify its malign influence, the incubation of 
this Sea Monster was under the shelter of the Flag of England, 
that its struggles into life in its destined element, wherein it sought 
the shores of Terceira, were by prostituting the same Flag, — and 
finally that it obtained its insidious and destructive power under 
the shelter of the Elag of Portugal, in defiance of the repeated 
injunctions of the Authorities to leave her Sovereignty inviolate. 

Thence-forward, as though revelling in his lawlessness and, 
with a deep cunning, foreseeing as its consequence a provocation 
to hostilities between England and the United States, to which 
last he owes allegiance as a Citizen, and which, as an Officer, he 
had sworn to support, — he has prosecuted a cruel War upon the 
Ocean against his peaceful fellow citizens of America ; — assuming, 
for this purpose, the Flag of England sometimes and at others the 
Flag of the United States,— first one disguise and than another as 
a decoy, and even burning ships at night instead of day, in order 
to attract the sympathy of unwary Seamen to the spot whereat he 
was lying in wait for their capture ; nor has the property of other 
Nations escaped his work of spoliation and destruction, whilst it 
has inflicted great hardships and exposure upon innocent Seamen 
and even upon Women and children. 

Thus, — having no Court of Prize or legal status anywhere, — 
his cruizes have been marked by burning wrecks, as from point to 
point in the Oceans he had been chased by the National Vessels 
of War. Driven from the North Atlantic by them, he sought the 



ALABAMA AND HER COMMANDER. 



IB 



Coasts of Brazil ; and there, with characteristic insolence, violated 
the Sovereignty of that Empire, which produced a Decree of 
expulsion and exclusion. 

We next hear of him off the Cape of Good Hope, and more 
recently near Java, and the last day or two near Singapore, — 
intercepting and destroying vessels : in one case effecting a capture 
with# British Register; in several, destroying the property of 
neutrals on board American ships. 

Secondly. — In short, so obviously illegal is her origin and 
her career, that it is understood that the Government of the United 
States considers itself justified in presenting the claims of its citi- 
zens, for the losses inflicted upon them, to the British Government ; 
and the recent seizure of the Rebel Rams in the Mersey, indicates 
the measurable concurrence, at least, of Her Majesty's Ministers 
in the views of the former. 

These are the facts, and such is substantially the history of 
the Alamabas origin and career ; and it would seem that no one 
can doubt that it is marked by the characteristics of lawlessness, 
rather than with those of legality : — Thus marked in the eye of the 
Law of Nations, and in the eye of the Laws of England. 

Thirdly. — And quite aside of and beyond these elements of 
the question of legality, is the other most important one, that the 
United States Government has not acquiesced in the recognition 
of the revolted portion of the Southern people of the Union as 
properly entitled to the rights of Belligerents at Sea. 

What, then, is the status of Raphael Semmes, according to 
the Laws of both the United States and England? — The answer 
is found in the following citation of the Law, though I am unable 
to name the Statute. — By various " statutes in England and the 
" United States, other offences (beside robbing) are made piracy." 

" Thus, if a subject of either of those Nations commits any 
" act of hostility against a fellow subject on the high Seas, under 
" color of a commission from any foreign power, this is an act of 
" piracy." 

And what would be the predicament of the British Seamen 
among her crew, if the principle which the British Government 
sought to establish at the outbreak of the Crimean War had been 
acquiesced in by the United States ? 

I find the proposition cited in Wheaton (last edition) as 
follows : 



16 



PAPERS ON THE 



" Both Great Britain and France would, at this time, most 
" readily, enter into a Convention, stipulating that their subjects 
" or citizens, their Government being a neutral, who shall accept a 
" commission or letter of Marque to engage in the Privateer service, 
" the other party to the Convention being a belligerent, may be 
" treated as pirates." 

The Declaration of the 16th of April 1856 by the Congress 
of Paris did not make this point conclusive with all Nations ; but 
it was not because the United States stopped short of so high a 
principle : It was, rather, that the leading powers of Europe hesi- 
tated to give completion to the principle, as you have seen in the 
Memorandum of Count Walewski, already sent to you, — the 
counter-proposition being therein mentioned, though it is not stat- 
ed in its entirety. And as it is of permanent value, as well as of 
present interest, I here embody it, in the words of President 
Pierce, as follow ; 

"The proposal to surrender the right to employ privateers is 
" professedly founded upon the principle, that private property of 
" unoffending non-combatants, though enemies, should be exempt 
" from the ravages of War ; but the proposed surrender goes but 
" little way in carrying out that principle, which equally requires 
" that such private property should not be seized or molested by 
" national ships of war. Should the leading powers of Europe 
" concur in proposing, as a rule of international law, to exempt 
" private property, upon the Ocean, from seizure by public armed 
" cruisers, as well as by privateers, the United States will readily 
" meet them upon that broad ground." 

This overture has never been accepted by England and France, 
yet although they have not carried the ameliorative principle, 
which it embodies, into practical effect, there is no doubt as to the 
general sense of the civilized World at the present day. — 

It favors the application of the ameliorative principle to all 
the relations of man ; and hence the violent strivings in a wilfully- 
retrogressive course by a portion of the Southern people, wherein 
you consider Raphael Semmes a conspicuous object, is repugnant 
to the better instincts of the time, — however heroic the actors 
may be. — But I fear to overrun your space, remaining, Your 
Subscriber. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, 18th January, 1864. 



ALABAMA AND HER COMMANDER. 



17 



Editorial of the " Daily Press." 



It will of course be premature in us to review the letter of 
our esteemed correspondent E. P. U. which appeared in our issue of 
yesterday — but we would remark en passant, that the term "goose" 
as applied by us when discussing the point as to whether Captain 
Semmes is or is not a pirate, was of course applicable only in a 
Pickwickian sense. Such being the case the " high moral position 
of the Madras Athenceum and of the Friend of India, has no refer- 
ence to the point of the term goose being applicable to them — for 
there may be vicious geese, such as Abraham Lincoln ; or Arith- 
metical geese, like Dr. Colenso ; or highly moral geese such as 
Dr. Cumming. The Friend of India has strong missionary and 
Federal proclivities — the Madras Athenceum we never saw in our 
life, so that it cannot be a journal of much weight we should 
suppose. However, let the question at issue stand upon its own 
merits. The point to decide is, whether Captain Semmes of the 
Alabama, can be deemed a pirate by any train of reasoning, moral 
or legal. 

We have no objection to the special pleading of E. P. U. nor 
his beating about the bush as much as he pleases. The plums 
which he throws out by the way make ample restitution for the 
deviation — but he must not suppose for one moment that we shall 
lose sight of the main point : nor must he fancy that he has proved 
the Alabama to be a pirate. 

He had much better describe what constitutes piracy — and 
then dispose of the dictum that the Alabama is a cruizer belonging 
to a belligerent state which is responsible for her acts. 



(Issue of 20th.) 




is. 



PAPERS ON THE 



$M Casual papers npm % 

glminait (Qncstioit, mxi mi&mhU^ npn 
Mntwml mmxtxw. 



Editorial of the "Daily Press" of St/i February, 1864. 

We take from the Calcutta Phoenix an account reproduced by 
that paper from a Cape Journal, of the high handed seizure of a 
British vessel, by the Federal War steamer Vanderbilt. We 
commend this to the perusal of our astute, and respected corres- 
pondent E. P. U. We ask him what would have been said had 
the Alabama acted in this manner ? We ask him to view the 
occurrence from the same stand point as that which induced him 
to pronounce Capt. Semmes a pirate. Should he adopt our 
suggestion, we shall really feel obliged to him to apply his prin- 
ciples to the conduct of Capt. Roderick Dew of Her Majesty's 
ship Encounter, during his career at Ningpo, who, after coalescing 
in a most sneaking underhand manner with the notorious pirate 
Apak, slew a number of people who courted his friendship and 
towards whom Her Majesty's government had declared themselves 
neutral. Nay more, — contrary to express orders, Capt. Dew 
used the armament and the men belonging to the ship under his 
command, to invade Chinese territory, breaching the walls of 
Shaoushing, simply because the Imperialists could not do so 
themselves. If such acts can be justified, then England stands in 
the same position as the Dey of Algiers did. 

As the Alabama and the Vanderbilt are on the tapis in special 
reference to illegal acts at sea, in common fairness we must bring- 
in the Encounter. The murder of Gray was a brutal act, but a 
paltry retail one in comparison to what Capt. Dew has commited. 



AMEBICAN QUESTION. 



19 



REPLY OF E. P. U. TO THE ABOVE. 

To the Editor of the " Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor.— Your premature appeal to me of the 8th inst., 
which reached me yesterday evening, upon the case of the Saxon's 
seizure by the U. S. S. Vanderbilt at Angra Pequina, only serves 
to remind me of what I would fain forget, as the most disagreable 
feature of all questions between our respective countries. 

I mean the animus wherewith any incident of our relations 
susceptible of adverse interpretation is seized upon by a portion 
of the British Press, to embitter and lend acerbity to discussions, 
which in the multitude of points of contact between rival commu- 
nities of the same active, not to say aggressive, race must naturally 
arise in a period of War. 

The captious and hostile spirit of this rampant portion of the 
Press has perverted one of the noblest of causes, and betrayed 
many estimable people, who now, — on feeling their footing getting 
insecure, — are casting about for plausible reasons for their lapse 
of faith ; and blunder not a little in the search, — as we see, for 
instance, in the last issue of your weekly contemporary. 

The multitude are not so much to blame, for, in truth, there 
was a total want of philosophical breadth of statesmanship in the 
accepted Oracles of the people, until recently. 

The premature recognition of the South as belligerents lent 
the rebellion great support ; and so, step by step, a bad cause and 
a desperate venture were gilded in the eyes of that people whom 
we were wont to regard as eminently practical and prudent. Then, 
emboldened, those birds of ill omen — the stormy Petrels of the 
Press, who hover near the brink of War, began to shew their 
plumage, like mercenary Soldiers of fortune whose prosperity lies 
in aggravation of the strife ; and well wrought they in their calling 
of evil, albeit with rusty weapons. Latent prejudices were warmed 
into new life, and where the record was bare ^(mvention^) supplied 
food for invective, until the passions of multitudes were aroused, 
and the Trent affair was seized upon with a shout of welcome. 
The petulant Mother was not to be crossed, whatever the 
Daughter s exigency might be ! — 

Prophet of Peace as I was on that occasion, I have since 
rejoiced to see a gradual subsidence of the angry waves of feeling 



20 



PAPERS ON THE 



in England ; and, at length, in the seizure of the Rebel Rams, a 
guarantee of good faith, which is all that America asks for, though 
she has rightful claim to reciprocal consideration and a legitimate 
craving of sympathy. — - 

Such craving being the earnest of friendliness, not to say 
affection, has little deserved the bitter taunts in which the Times 
and Saturday Review indulged ; and but that the labored sophis- 
tries of the one and the sugared poisons of the other have nauseated 
great numbers of the British people, the Avounds might rankle. 

Betrayed by its animus, the Times forgot its role of prudence 
in respect to Foreign stocks and leading its readers into subscriptions 
to the Confederate Loan, lost 800 subscribers, after the first fall in 
August, in one week, it is said ; and the only strange thing about 
its blundering and unprincipled course, as of that of the Saturday 
Review, is that their readers did not revert to their former record 
upon American questions to test their good-faith and consistency, 
instead of echoing their special pleading for the Rebels. 

Let us glance momentarily at a few instances of their incon- 
sistency, which have accidentally met my eye recently. 

Thus : — in 1860 the Saturday Review, in noticing a pamphlet 
of Mr.Wm.B. Lawrence, of Rhode Island, upon "Cotton prospects," 
alluded to the "traditional hostility " of his — the Democratic 
party — toward England ; and did the Republican party the justice 
to speak of it as contending, " not for the abolition of Slavery in 
the States, but against its intrusion into the Territories," — yet 
has not scrupled, the past two years, to stultify itself by affiliating 
with the former party and maligning the latter. 

Its closing paragraph, assuming to be dictated from the loftiest 
point of view of high-toned principle, and to be addressed to all 
Europe, was as follows : — 

" We trust that Europeans will never persuade themselves, 
" like Mr. Lawrence's political friends, that what is very difficult 
" to remedy, is justified by the difficulty. — Saturday Review. 

But what shall we now say of its principles, after reading its phi- 
lippics against the Republican party, when grappling with this very 
difficulty; — a difficulty magnified many times by this punic faith? 

As to the Times, one instance will also suffice to shew how 
inconsistent Avith its real principles and opinions, as applied to 
European politics and national life, are those which it sophistically 
assumes in discussing the American question. — 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



21 



Thus, in a leading article of August last, it noticed the Con- 
gress of Frankfort and in an elaborate and able exposition of the 
great question of the day in Germany, if not of En rope, exposed 
the evils of its divided nationalities in a sense the most apposite to 
the American question, and with an earnest craving of German 
unity that bespoke the desire of such a powerful counterpoise of 
Prance ; — forgetful, the while, of its accustomed reasoning in a 
contrary sense against the efforts of the United States to preserve 
its national unity, which so palpably betrays its jealousy of the 
American counterpoise to England on the Sea. I reproduce a few r 
brief extracts in illustration, as follow: — 

" These Kingdoms, and Duchies, and Principalities all go to 
" make up one sole nation, and the settlement of the relations 
" between them is to a great extent the same thing as it would be 
" to arrange afresh the votes and relative influence of our English 
" and Scotch Counties. The truth is that the political development 
"of Germany is two or three centuries or more behind that of 
" every other European State except Russia. There was a time 
"in the history of all European States when they were composed 
"of a number of half independent Dukedoms, Principalities, or 
" Kingdoms, but in all but Germany the force and vigour of some 
" leading member of the body has gradually extinguished the others 
" and absorbed them into one State. It is only necessary to look 
" through a series of good chronological maps of Europe to see the 
" way in which this process has been carried out in Prance and 
" Italy. In each of these countries, wise and sagacious Sovereigns 
"have taken advantage of the weaknesses or the jealousies of minor 
" /States to crush or absorb them one by one, and they have grown 
"into their present harmonized form out of what seemed at first a 
" fortuitous concourse of atoms. * * * 

" Various, but hitherto abortive, efforts have been made to 
"stop this tendency to disintegration, and to establish a great 
" German nationality, or Federation. Ever since the Pirst 
" Napoleon destroyed the old German Empire, the dread of a 
"similar dissolution has existed in the German mind, and its 
"whole internal policy has been directed to prevent it. The 
"German Confederation of 1815 was intended to be an effective 
"substitute for the old Empire, and to constitute a great central 
" European Power. But it was too late in the day to bring about 
" a real unity. As in the natural body, so in the political, unity 



22 



PAPERS ON THE 



"grows out of variety, and one body is composed of various 
" elements ; but if the elements do not assimilate at once they 
" get a habit of isolation and grow into separate and distinct 
" forms. * * * * 

" While this unwieldy, somewhat heavy, and ponderous mass 
"of German nationality has been thinking, and doubting, and 
" hesitating how to act and how to consolidate itself, a more 
" sharpwitted nation on the one side, and a more unscrupulous 
" and less thoughtful Empire on the other, have been growing into 
" united and condensed Powers, which threaten to cut in sunder 
" the German nation at its very centre. Fiance on one side, and 
" Russia on the other, are inserting the points of territorial wedges 
"which, threaten to force the German national body into two 
" separate divisions. 

* * * * 

" The weakness of the scheme consists in its want of a broad, 
"popular basis. It begins from the top, and not from the bottom. 
" It does not strike its roots deep in the people of Germany, and 
" would be likely to break up with the jealousies and rivalries of 
" Princes. It is proposed, indeed, to establish also an Assembly 
" of Delegates ; but this is only to meet once every three years, 
" and its members are not to be elected by the people of the 
" different States, but by the several Diets. We do not wonder 
" that the Assembly of Delegates now at Frankfort should consider 
"that this scheme offers a too narrow popular basis for so vast a 
" superstructure, and should see little hope of a permanent con- 
struction of German unity which is not based upon deep popular 
" representation. * * 

" The Bund was a mere bundle of sticks, some big and some 
" little, but none of them growing together, and loosely bound by 
" an artificial bond. * * 

" It is at least certain that the German Federation cannot 
"continue to exist as it does as present." 

Yet, in America, the Times would like to see the same process 
of disintegration applied, the same experiment tried over again ! — 

Such are some of the betrayals of the animus actuating a 
portion of the British Press, which are here instanced as shewing 
abandonment of principles, leaving the numerous cases of perversion 
of facts ; but, on the other hand, several influential Journals and 
measurably some of the Periodicals have striven against the torrent 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



2:5 



of abuse launched at the Northern people and aided by many 
estimable persons among the nobility and gentry have, at length, 
turned the popular current into a more peaceful channel. 

Assuredly America's record is bright by the side of England, 
whether we regard the past, the recent or the present. In both 
the Crimea and India, England ■ fought for Empire ; — America 
fights for National life. 

And that my Countrymen find appreciative regard among 
the gifted portion of yours, as well as among the middle classes, 
is shewn by the subjoined extract of a paper in " Erasers Magazine," 
which I gladly reproduce. 

" Grand National Spectacle of the United States Putting 
" down the Rebellion. — Fraser's Magazine (a high Tory organ in 
" London) for October, says : 

" If it is true that the North have had in arms some 800,000 
"men, and which is absurd, we allow 300,000 of them to have 
" been mercenaries, it would still be true that a population not 
" exceeding Great Britain sent 500,000 into the field. This would 
"be at the very least one-eighth of the grown-up men of the 
" country. When we consider that this effort was made, not 
"against an invader, nor under the pressure of want, but in the 
" midst of unbounded prosperity, and in order to support the 
"glory and credit of the nation, it is bare justice to say that the 
"history of mankind can furnish no other example of such an 
" effort. The Dutch fought the Spaniards for their hearths, homes 
"and churches; the French fought all Europe, with famine and 
"the guillotine behind them, and empire in front. The English 
" in India had the pride of a superior race and the memories of 
" inexpiable injuries to urge them against the Sepoys ; but if ever 
" a nation sacrifices itself deliberately and manfully to an idea, 
"this has been the case with the Americans. Admit for the sake 
"of argument that they are altogether wrong, still their intense 
"and earnest sincerity, and their single minded self-devotion, are 
" magnificent, and ought to have excited the admiration instead 
"of the sneer of their kindred." 

Trusting that you are still in a receptive humor for "plums " 
and that you will find those dropped in the foregoing divergencies 
from the direct path fruity enough for the wedding cake of the 
new union of our respective people's hearts, I now turn briefly to 
the case of the " Saxon " : — To say : — 



24 



PAPERS ON THE 



First. That I do not mean to put you into the category of 
the rampant Journals upon the American question ; but only to 
say that you have taken too much for granted in disparagement of 
the North, and, concurrently, have been too receptive of matter in 
favour of the South. 

This has shown, not so much personal bias or animus, as a 
too implicit faith in the popular organs in England ; and your 
inconsistency, as it strikes me, has been in thus according confidence 
to those whose policy in China and Japan you have condemned : — - 
that is to say, if I rightly understand you upon these hitter points, 
you concur with myself in the policy of applying the tentative 
method of treatment in Japan, rather than the dominating, and 
the same toward the Taipings. 

Secondly. As to the merits of this case of the Saxon : — they 
lie chiefly on the surface ; and I think you would do well to wait 
for the statement of the other side. 

Angra Peqnina is not British, but independent (Hottentot) 
territory, I think; and it was thence that the "skins and wool" 
were shipped to the " Saxon :" This cargo was that of the 
" Tuscaloosa " — formerly " Conrad " of Philadelphia, seized by the 
Alabama and manned as a Cruiser. 

As to the shooting of Gray, it was declared to be accidental ; 
and it is evident from Capt. Shepard's statement that the brandish- 
ing of arms was warranted by the defiant attitude and language 
of himself and his crew, — the more so that the Vanderbilt had 
gone away in chase of another vessel at the time. 

As to the Coal at Penguin Island, that was no doubt 
awaiting a Confederate Steamer; and it seems that no British 
Authority whatever was there to keep police of either shore or sea, 
and that the Vanderbilt was the only National authority to maintain 
either, according to International Law. 

There should be a visible proof of Sovereignty on land or a 
properly commissioned man of war to exercise authority; and 
failing such, Captain Baldwin was the only competent party to 
deal with outlaws or suspected persons ; and it seems that the 
only people seen were supposed to be men from the Alabama, 
probably left in charge of the Coal. 

Thirdly. But my point is that, having seen the result of the 
great outcry and threatening of war in the "Peterhoff" case and 
similar hasty ebullitions, public Journalists should be chary of 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



25 



grievance-mongers and wait for the statements of both parties 
before attempting to arouse national feeling. — 

The exercise of simple prudence which the absence of animus 
permits, will save a deal of mortification and much bad blood, 
and confer upon an Editor the credit for that astuteness which 
you bestow upon the undeserving 

E. P. U. 

Macao, 10th February, 1864. 



Editorial of the Daily Press of February \Qth, 1864. 

In the proper place will be found a brilliant letter from 
E. P. U. We are too happy to give him a clear st? je without 
favor, not deeming it courteous to stand between him and the 
public in the due perusal of his remarks. We shall however 
review his letter to-morrow, being by no means prepared to allow 
some of his dicta to pass unnoticed and therefore negatively 
endorsed by us. 



Editorial of February \%tl, 1864. 

In replying to the very able letter of E. P. U. which appeared 
in our issue of Monday, we propose in the first place to expose 
what we deem the fallacious groundwork of his arguments, and 
then to attack his salient points seriatim. 

He appears to be impressed with the deep conviction that 
the constitution of the United States, as established by their Inde- 
pendence, is a divine institution, which it is nothing short of 
impiety to sever. This is the error that all writers with Northern 
predilections fall into. It is not for the Czar, nor for any loyal 
Russian to judge of the Polish question — it is not for the Pope nor 
for any pious catholic who upholds the temporal power of the Pontiff, 
to judge of the movement to liberate Italy — it was not for King 
George the Third, nor for the old English Tories to judge of the 
American war of independence. And finally, for the purposes of 
our argument, it does not lie within the province or capacity of 
the devoted, patriotic, and aggressive North, to judge of the just- 
ness, gravity or tangible integrity of the Confederate cause. 



26 



PAPERS ON THE 



The object of a rebellion is either to reform abuses and remove 
grievances, to subvert a government, or otherwise, to bring about 
a separation. Speaking historically, or politically, all rebellions 
are legal that are strong enough to sustain themselves ; there is no 
crime in rebellion except the attempt to carry one out by insuffi- 
cient means. They who rebel are the judges of their own cause, 
and it is sheer infatuation for those who are rebelled against to 
pass judgment on the cause of the insurgents. 

If E. P. U's assumption of faith in the divine principle of the 
constitution of the North be correct, how can he reconcile the 
American rebellion, now called the War of Independence, to right 
and justice ? It might be argued, that the American colonists 
had the option of leaving the country if they could not live under 
the laws as they were administered by the rightful sovereign, but 
that by no principle of right or reason could they lay violent hands 
on the administration, and oust the legal authorities by force of 
arms. The action of the South in the present war, does not go 
half the length that the American colonies went to in the " War 
of Independence." Then the existing government was attacked 
and ousted, all its property confiscated and its authority entirely 
subverted. At present the Confederates seek simply to separate, 
peacably if they may be allowed, but otherwise by war to the 
bitter end. Their cause is not aggressive, nor clo they demand 
anything but preservation of their rights. 

We do not wish to compare the cause of American indepen- 
dence with the Confederate cause — nor do we wish to advocate 
the latter in the most remote degree. The people of the Confede- 
rate states are the judges of it. — That they have rebelled there can 
be no doubt — and that they have sustained their rebellion in a man- 
ner to entitle them to the rights of belligerents, there can be as little. 
Take the history of the world and it will be seen that rebellions 
are the safety valves of the people against absolute, oppressive, or 
inapplicable governments. To repudiate the right of people to 
rebel would be to revert to the days of the Csesars ; and to question 
the right of rebellions would bring us no further down than the 
days of the Crusaders. 

Moreover, the cause of the South is not a myth. From the day 
of the Declaration of Independence up to the raid of John Brown 
at Harper's Ferry, it has been prognosticated time and again, that 
the question of Slavery would split the Union. So long as the 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



27 



slave interest had a preponderance, this consummation was deferred, 
naturally — but immediately that preponderance was lost, slavery 
had to be preserved by secession. 

Furthermore, judging of the Southern rebellion by its strength, 
it commands more respect than any rebellion on record. It has 
baffled three quarters of a million of men and a powerful fleet for 
nearly three years — it has caused the North permanent^ to 
suspend the habeas corpus, and to resort to a forced conscription 
—creating a Federal debt of two thousand millions of dollars and 
driving gold to 50 per cent premium. 

But beyond all these powerful considerations, there is one 
still stronger. Namely, that whilst the Confederate States were 
being ravaged and convulsed by this great resistance, the civil 
administration was conducted in the most organised efficient man- 
ner possible. The refusal on the part of Great Britain to recognise 
the Confederate States as a belligerent power, would have been 
fully tantamount to the abrogation of all those principles on which 
our ideas of liberty are based, and on which indeed our constitu- 
tion hangs. 

So much for the texture of E. P. U's arguments. We need 
not venture on the justness of the Southern cause— we have no 
property in slaves ; if we had, and if we felt that such property 
would become endangered by the preponderance of the Republican 
party, a " fellow feeling might make us wondrous kind." We 
limit ourselves to the fact that the Confederate rebellion has been 
sustained in such a manner as to entitle it to respect and consider- 
ation, and that its recognition as a belligerent power was inevitable. 
Now for our correspondent's salient points. 

We fully agree with E. P. U. as to the mercenary character 
of the London Times. We are convinced that it never espouses a 
cause without a valid consideration, a rigid understanding. Equal- 
ly convinced are we that it never condemns a cause without an 
unworthy motive or a tangible inducement. It is as unscrupulous 
in pursuit of its objects, as it is regardless of truth in either its 
praises or its invectives. It is a disgrace to the nation. 

At the same time, in relation to the rampant animus of the 
Times, the Saturday Review, and other English papers against 
the Federal States, — we differ widely from our correspondent. 
We think the British people and the British press have been slow 
to anger in this matter. We have an idea that hatred and abuse 



28 



PAPERS ON THE 



of England has been the leading topic of newspapers and politicians 
in the United States, for many years past. Investing in the 
aspiration in type, on the stump or in the forum, was certain capital. 
We are told that all this is superficial scum, and that a very dif- 
ferent feeling exists below the surface. Faith then the surface is 
a pretty stiff encrustation, for we have never yet been able to get 
through it. Do we look for the reverse of the characteristic in 
the policy of the Union ? Why that policy is actuated and con- 
trolled, not by dictates of diplomacy or statesmanship, but by 
hostility to England. The Monroe doctrine, the Mcjrel tariff, the 
affection for Russia, the policy in China, the interference in Japan, 
the ocean telegraphic scheme, are all impulses of the hostility we 
indicate. Do we look for this redeeming under-current in Presi- 
dent Lincoln's cabinet ? In the leading American firms in China ? 
Where, where shall we find it ? 

We think E. P. U. is wrong to attack the rampant animus of 
the British press against the Federal cause. We do not go so far 
as to say that the British people are so well Christianised as to 
present a second cheek to be struck ; but we say that with excusable 
frailties upon them, they have been provoked to the animus which 
E. P. U. laments, by the abusive epithets, the taunting sneers, the 
bitter reproaches, the frantic threats, which for years have formed 
the theme, of the United States press, stump and forum, and which 
in our opinion forms the guiding principle of every American 
politician of the day. The British people and press have been 
provoked to retaliate we admit, and although they have kept 
within bounds, they have retaliated most effectively. The anger 
of our cousins is simply ludicrous, E. P. U's. simplicity in assuming 
the indignant on the point, being admirable special pleading. 

Our correspondent in our opinion errs in his deduction on 
the arguments of the Tiroes in favor of united Germany. The 
Times argued that Germany should be united, to the end that it 
may be able to repel the aggressions of Prance and Russia. The 
United States have not Russia at the North of them nor France 
in the South of them, therefore the analogy falls to the ground 
and so does the charge of inconsistency. The United States 
are as large as Europe. Surely the Times never argued that all 
Europe should be united in one nation. We fail to see the smallest 
analogy of applicability in the remarks of the Times on Germany to 
the separation of the Confederate from the Federal States. 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



29 



Neither do we see that E. P. U's. charge against the Satur- 
day Review is much better put. The charge simple amounts to 
this, — that in 1860, the Saturday Review complimented the 
Republican party because it was adverse to the spread of Slavery 
in the territories — and abused the Democratic party for the reverse 
tendency and for hostility to England — whilst now in 1864 the 
same paper abuses the Republican party for continuing, what it 
deems a hopeless, endless, bloody, ruinous war; and upholds 
the Democratic party for seeking to stop it. Where is the 
inconsistency ? Had the Republican party on the breaking out 
of the rebellion, based their cause on the abolition of Slavery, E. 
P. U. would be right — but they did not. They trimmed their 
sails to the wind and they were open to any offer whereby the 
security of slavery should be perpetuated, if the seceding states 
would only return to the Union. 

E. P. U. says that in the Crimea, England fought for Empire. 
We say this is not the case. She fought for the observance of 
treaties, and for the balance of power in Europe. By no possible 
result could Empire have been acquired through the Crimean war. 

E. P. U. says that the United States is fighting for national 
life. That we doubt very much. We feel more inclined to the 
belief that by continuing the fight in the manner she is doing, she 
is extinguishing her national life. There is a county in Ireland 
called Tipperary, where the people are so ungovernable that even 
now real estate is not worth half the price it would be in other 
counties. Should the North acknowledge the independence of 
the South, two neighbouring well organised governments would 
be the result, with slavery to keep them asunder, and with com- 
mercial treaties to make mutual intercourse profitable. Should 
the North subdue the South, the latter may become a Tipperary 
on a grand scale, as General Scott prognosticated, requiring 
300,000 men to keep it down. Under such a state of things, no 
capitalist would invest in the country, and without capital the 
South would become a desert. 

We hope that our correspondent's version of the Saxon's 
affair is correct. We agree with him entirely on the cargo having 
been taken from a Federal merchantman — also on the coal store 
being meant for Confederate cruisers. But we fear the territory 
is British and we cannot think that Gray's death was accidental. 
Capt. Shephard of the Saxon distinctly states that Captain Baldwin 



30 



PAPERS ON THE 



of the Vanderbilt placed the officer who fired the pistol under 
arrest, and that all his fellow officers cut him. All the witnesses 
say that after shooting Gray, the murderer pointed his pistol at the 
victim, and said he was one of the Alabama's men. 

Let us put our correspondent right about the Trent affair. 
We feel rather angry with him at the way he puts it. He speaks 
as if the British government had availed of the opportunity to 
make political capital out of the circumstance. An outrage was 
committed which at the commencement of the war could not possi- 
bly be overlooked, because had it been, such outrages would have 
become the order of the day. If England really were hostile to 
the North, she would have provoked a Avar out of the affair, in 
which case, the South must have gained the upper hand and the 
North gone to the vocative. But mark how England did — she 
sent a few batteries and ships of war to Canada — to show she was 
in earnest : she conducted the negotiations with the utmost deli- 
cacy, and she induced all the great powers to state to the Federal 
cabinet that she was right. The fault lay with President Lincoln 
— he could have declared the seizure of the envoys illegal as he 
must have known it was, and have ordered their liberation. 

But Americans will not comprehend one thing. — We suffered 
so dreadfully by our interference in the last great European war, 
that we will interfere no more. We have had our lesson and a 
dreadful one it was. It may be relied on that England will 
study neutrality in this American struggle, above all things — and 
further that she never would have acknowledged the South as a 
belligerent state, because of the stigma of slavery, but that neu- 
trality dictated it. 



To the Editor of the "Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor. — I find your rejoinder to my letter of the 10th 
inst. in yesterday's "Press"; and although it commences with a 
gratuitous declaration as to what my Faith is, which I can charac- 
terize as nothing less than a wholesale begging of the question 
between us, yet it is conceived in such good temper as betokens 
the narrowing of the issue, as between ourselves, and so far over- 
comes the repugnance that I feel to participation in public 
controversy that I shall still attempt to illustrate some points of 
difference between us. 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



31 



I shall do so in the words of others, rather than my own ; — 
not only for the reason that those are more weighty, but because 
of the general consideration that a certain reserve is imposed upon 
Americans in China in discussing questions which, from the 
attitude of a portion of the Press, have become matter of controversy 
at home, — imposed by reason of our being a minority in the com- 
munity and from the desire of preserving the amenities of good 
neighborhood with those amongst whom many of us have sojourned 
for years. — 

My citations will be partly from English sources, partly from 
American, and to the substantial woof of the argument thus 
obtained, I shall add little more than a slight running thread of 
connective comment ; — the savor of an offensive intrusion of merely 
individual opinion being thus excluded. 

But, imprimis, as to the first article of my political Faith, — 
of my fidelity to which you avouch yourself a witness : — I had 
not thought of renewing my vows before a foreign audience ; but 
since you do not inpute to me a Hamilcar-like oath of eternal 
hatred of either the modern Rome or Carthage, and paint me, 
rather, as one of many millions of blind votaries around the altar 
of Union, I can have no hesitation in declaring my sincere attach- 
ment to the Institutions of my Country or my unswerving loyalty 
to the Constitution of the United States, — although I regard them 
with the temperate admiration of deliberate conviction rather than 
the imputed enthusiastic adoralion which might be less enduring. 

Heirs of the constitutional rights of Englishmen, reasserted 
and established at the period of the Common-wealth and preserved 
to them by transplantation before the lapse from the principle of 
mutuality between governors and governed, — arising from the 
lamentable reaction at the period of the restoration, — Americans 
have had the vantage-ground of an unobstructed career before 
them thence-forward. 

Whilst in England much of the ground had to be retraversed 
by struggle upon struggle, the collective mind of America, — 
chastened and enriched, undoubtedly, in the meantime by the 
indirect influence of these travails of the Mother Country, — after 
passing through the purifying fire of the Revolution and the 
wholesome discipline of the probation period of the Confederation, 
was prepared for the full enunciation of the principle of mutuality ; 
—and the only halting in the practical enforcement of the fun- 



32 



PAPERS ON THE 



damental maxim that all men are free and equal was in respect to 
the Slaves, whose gradual emancipation was then anticipated so 
far as to prevent their being named at all in the instrument, as 
such. — 

I here find myself upon the confines of a very wide field of 
discussion upon which I have no disposition to enter, as I have 
before intimated ; and hasten to say that I intend no comparison 
between the constitutions of Great Britain and the United States, 
but only to allude to our conjoint history to mark the initial point 
of America's inheritance of civil and Religious liberty and trace its 
transmission to the present time : — For, firm as my conviction is 
that the theory of the Government of my country is beneficent in 
the highest degree predicative of mankind, and that the elimination 
of the sole obstructive element already alluded to will render its 
practical working beneficent also, in a degree beyond any other 
system, — yet I have such a measure of respect for the well-consi- 
dered opinions of Englishmen and so just an appreciation of the 
British constitution, as precludes any attempt to impair their faith 
in it. 

Nor am I unconscious that in the opinion of many Europeans, 
Republicanism is upon its trial still ; but if you add that it has 
been found wanting, I take issue with you there as upon premature 
assumption. 

I declare, — I, who have spent a quarter of a century in China 
and become so cosmopolitan that some of my countrymen, who, 
albeit, thin-skinned themselves yet forget that very incisive weapons 
cut both ways, consider me too philosophical— too little resentful 
of national affronts — I, who but for these special circumstances 
could not be permitted so to speak to the people of other countries, 
declare the fullest confidence in the present generation of the 
American people, whose virtue and intelligence are the fruit of 
this system of Government ; and hence confidence in the working 
of it, after that cancer in the body politic — Slavery, — whence 
poison has flown to the source of executive power for half a century 
or more, has been removed. Painful, nay, agonizing as the opera- 
tion is, we know, — as in the case of individuals undergoing the 
same, — that life is the stake ; and this the life of the nation. 

It requires valor, fortitude, public virtue ; but I say to you, 
as I say to men of every nationality, — so much of valor, so much 
of fortitude, so much of public virtue as you feel that your own 



AMEEICAN QUESTION. 



33 



countrymen have and would evince, the full measure of each I ask 
you to attribute to the brave, the generous, the resolute, the vir- 
tuous American people. 

So much, in denial of your imputing to me an unreasoning- 
Faith, I have felt bound to say of the Constitution of my own 
country ; and that I may not be misunderstood by the use of the 
mere negative as respects that of England, I here reproduce what 
I wrote of it when alluding to the polity of China (in I860,) as 
follows : 

" That the system of Government — the polity of China, when 
" administered in integrity, was practically successful for a remark- 
" able period of time, is true ; and that it attained under successive 
" Rulers, guided by the wisdom of the Sages, to a point of remark- 
" able efficiency, considering the extent and diversity of the Empire, 
" is also true ; — but having reached its culminating point of 
" efficiency several centuries ago, its inherent vices have since 
"gradually undermined it, until there is, rather, a tradition and a 
" dream of past greatness to form the slender thread holding Prince 
" and People together than any real and tangible basis of authority. 
" The bond between them has not had enough of the vital princi- 
"ple of mutuality in it and hence from friction has been weakened. 

" Its theory appears to promise what its prolonged practical 
" working has not fulfilled : — Although the gradual superstructure 
" of ages, yet it was not, at any period, in the same degree as the 
" constitutional Government of England is, the collective result of 
" the exigencies of the people and Nation evolved in the develop- 
" ment of centuries : — The compacted and consolidated whole 
" wrought out and perfected, through inherent springs of vitality, 
" by the improvements which prolong its existence by increasing 
" its usefulness." 

Having rent the veil wherewith you so adroitly, — as it were 
by a stroke of legerdemain, — invested the minds of myself and my 
countrymen of the Northern States, — charitably including many 
distinguished though besotted personages, while leaving the Rebels 
without it, and in full possession of the faculty to behold with 
clear mental vision the merits of the question of the Rebellion, — ■ 
we are now vis a vis to that question pure and simple ; — but my 
authorities to be marshalled against your reasoning will also sup- 
port my own in the foregoing, respecting the prejudicial influence of 
Slavery. 



PAPERS ON THE 



Regardful as well of your space, as of my own engagements, 
I shall restrict myself to-day to meeting the points you make 
justificatory of the Rebellion, though in terms you disclaim 
advocating its cause, by the following extract of the Oration of 
the Honorable Edward Everett delivered at the battlefield of 
Gettysburg on the 19th of November, which I found in a New 
York Journal on the 17th inst., most opportunely for my purpose. 

" And now, friends, fellow-citizens, as we stand among these 
honored graves, the momentous question presents itself : Which 
of the two parties to the war is responsible for all this suffering — 
for this dreadful sacrifice of life — the lawful and constitutional 
Government of the United States, or the ambitious men who have 
rebelled against it ? I say " rebelled " against it, though Earl 
Russell, the English Secretary of State for Foreign affairs, in his 
recent temperate and conciliatory speech in Scotland, seems to 
intimate that no prejudice ought to attach to that word inasmuch 
as our English forefathers rebelled against Charles I and James 
II., and our American fathers rebelled against George III. These 
certainly are venerable precedents, but they prove only that it is 
just and proper to rebel against oppressive governments. They 
do not prove that it was just and proper for the son of James II. 
to rebel against George I., or his grandson Charles Edward to 
rebel against George II. ; nor, as it seems to me, ought these 
dynastic struggles, little better than family quarrels, to be compared 
with this monstrous conspiracy against the American Union. 

"These precedents do not prove that it was just and proper 
for the " disappointed great men " of the cotton growing states to 
rebel against " the most beneficent government of which history 
gives us any account," as the Vice-President of the Confederacy, 
in November, 1860, charged them with doing. They do not 
create a presumption even in favor of the disloyal slaveholders of 
the South, who, living under a government of which Mr. Jefferson 
Davis, in the session of 1860-01, said that it was " the best 
Government ever instituted by man, unexceptionably administered, 
and under which the people have been prosperous beyond 
comparison with any other people whose career has been recorded 
in history " ; rebelled against it because their aspiring politcians, 
himself among the rest, were in danger of losing their monopoly 
of its offices. What would have been thought by an impartial 
posterity, of the American rebellion against George III, if the 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



35 



colonists had at all times been more than equally represented in 
Parliament, and James Otis, and Patrick Henry, and Washington, 
and Franklin, and the Adamses, and Hancock, and Jefferson, and 
men of their stamp, had for two generations enjoyed the confidence 
of the sovereign, and administered the government of the Empire ? 

" What would have been thought of the rebellion against 
Charles I., if Cromwell and the men of his school had been the 
responsible advisers of that Prince from his accession to the throne, 
and then, on account of a partial change in the Ministry, brought 
his head to the block, and involved the country in a desolating 
war ? What would have been thought of the Whigs of 1688, if they 
had themselves composed the Cabinet of James II., and been the 
advisers of the measures and the promoters of the policy which drove 
him into exile ? The Puritans of 1 640 and the Whigs of 1688 rebel- 
led against arbitrary power in order to establish constitutional liberty. 
If they had risen against Charles and James because those monarchs 
favored equal rights, and in order themselves, " for the first time 
in the history of the world," "to establish an oligarchy founded on 
the corner stone of slavery," they would truly have furnished a pre- 
cedent for the rebels of the South, but their cause would not have 
been sustained by the eloquence of Pym or of Somers, nor sealed with 
the blood of Hampden or Russell. I call the war which the Confeder- 
ates are waging against the Union "Rebellion," because it is one, and 
in grave matters it is best to call things by their right names. 

" The constitution of the United States puts " rebellion " on 
a par with "invasion." The constitution and law not only of 
England, but of every civilized country, regard them in the same 
light ; or rather, they regard the rebel in arms as far worse than 
the alien enemy. To levy war against the United States is the 
constitutional definition of treason, and that crime is by every 
civilized government, regarded as the highest which citizen or sub- 
ject can commit. Not content with the sanctions of human justice, 
of all the crimes against the law of the land, it is singled out for 
the denunciations of religion. The Litanies of every Church in 
Christendom, as far as I am aware, from the metropolitan cathe- 
drals of Europe to the humblest missionary chapel in the islands 
of the sea, concur with the Church of England in imploring the 
Sovereign of the Universe, by the most awful adjurations which 
the heart of man can conceive or his tongue utter to deliver us 
from " sedition, privy conspiracy, and rebellion." 



36 



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" And for good reason ; for while a rebellion against tyranny 
— a rebellion designed, after prostrating arbitrary power, to esta- 
blish free government on the basis of justice and truth, is an 
enterprise on which good men and angels may look with compla- 
cency, — an unprovoked rebellion of ambitious men against a bene- 
ficent government, for the purpose — the avowed purpose — of esta- 
blishing, extending, and perpetuating any form of injustice and 
wrong, is an imitation on earth of that first foul revolt of " the 
Infernal Serpent," which emptied Heaven of one-third part of its 
sons. Lord Bacon, " in the true marshaling of the Sovereign 
degrees of honor," assigns the first place to " the Conditores Imperi- 
orum, founders of states and commonwealths," and truly to build 
up from the discordant elements of our nature the passions, the 
interests, and the opinions of the individual man ; the rivalries of 
family, clan, and tribe ; the influence of climate ; the accidents of 
peace and war accumulated for ages, — to build up from these 
oftentimes warring elements a well compacted, prosperous, and 
powerful state, if it were to be accomplished by one effort or in 
one generation, would require a more than mortal skill. To 
contribute in some notable degree to this the greatest work of 
man, by wise and patriotic counsel in peace, and loyal heroism in 
war, is as high as human merit can well rise, and far more than to 
any of those to whom Bacon assigns this highest place of honor — 
Romulus, Cyrus, Cassar, Ottoman, Ismael — is it due to our 
Washington, as to the founder of the American Union. But if to 
achieve or help to achieve this greatest work of man's wisdom and 
virtue gives title to a place among the chief benefactors, rightful 
heirs of the benedictions of mankind, by equal reason shall the 
bold bad men, who seek to undo the noble work, Eversores 
Imperiorum, destroyers of States, who for base and selfish ends 
rebel against beneficent governments, seek to overturn wise cons- 
titutions, lay powerful republican Unions at the foot of foreign 
thrones, bring on civil and foreign war, anarchy at home, dictation 
abroad, desolation, ruin — by equal reason, I say, yes, a thousand 
fold stronger, shall they inherit the execrations of the ages." 

I shall resume the "thread" after Washington's birthday. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, 19th February, 1864. 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 87 



To the Editor of the "Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor. — Thanks to your Compositor's wits having gone 
a wool gathering with the woof my argument, the "thread of 
connective comment," which I promisedtoresume, assumes, — either 
by textual analogy or textile affinity, — the elastic quality of toool, and 
becomes of necessity, a slight running thread of corrective comment 
in restoration of the intended texture ; — as in plainer prose here 
followeth. — 

Thus, in the 3rd paragraph (of my letter of the 19th inst.) 
instead of " wool of the argument " read " woof of the argument." 
— In the 4th read, instead of "adorations what" "^doration 
which :" — In the second column, whereat I speak of the British 
Constitution, and quote my previous writings alluding to China, 
read " polity of China " instead of " policy of China ; " — a printer's 
error, by the bye the less excusable because the extract sent you 
was printed. 

Other errors are of minor importance or are too obvious for 
remark. 

But, in sober earnest, Mr. Editor, we have to deal with more 
serious perversions of texts ; — with a wilful, systematic and persis- 
tent damaging of the texture of the fair fabric of Peace, which — 
but for these sinister influences — would become firmly knit together 
by the loom and shuttle of a constant and mutually-beneficial 
intercourse : — 

This, at least, even if we disregard the higher considerations 
of a common origin, a common language and a common heritage 
of Constitutional Government ; which should form, — as they un- 
doubtedly do with great numbers of the British people, — a bond 
of sympathy between our respective Countries. Refraining, how- 
ever, from generalities which may seem hacknied, and admonished 
to brevity of remark, as well by the restricted space of a daily 
Journal as by my own engagements, I shall revert directly to the 
simple requirements of your text, after one glance over the broad field 
into which the greater scope of the last paragraph of your rejoinder 
tempts me. 

You therein say : " But Americans will not comprehend one 
"thing: We suffered so dreadfully by our interference in the 
" last great European War, that we will interfere no more. We 
" have had our lesson and a dreadful one it was. It may be relied 



38 



PAPERS ON THE 



" on that England will study neutrality in this American struggle 
" above all things — and further that she never would have acknow- 
" ledgecl the South as a belligerent state because of the stigma of 
" Slavery, but that neutrality dictated it." 

Mr. Editor, I had a similar fond delusion as to the salutary 
lessons of the great Wars of half a century ago ; I believed that 
England was wedded to peace thereby, and absorbed in devotion 
to economic concerns, — with, for variety's sake, a sufficing in- 
dulgence in sentiment and philanthrophy in the direction of Slavery 
and the Slave Trade : — But found, to my sorrow, when she " drift- 
ed into War" with Russia, as Lord Clarendon, then Foreign 
Secretary, expressed it, that I had staked too much upon this im- 
plicit faith. And to what, if your opinion is correct, are we to 
attribute that feverish and insatiable disposition to a snappish 
captiousness regarding the affairs of other Countries, which marks 
the attitude of the " Times " and other members of the press, and 
so vividly suggests the figure of blood hounds in leash, scenting 
an enemy in every breeze and ready to spring upon any stranger ? — 

If we amplify this question by two others, still more pregnant ; 
and in our groping, light upon the real cue to the answers, we shall 
gain a measurable satisfaction, though we may still be lost in 
wonder of the motives. These questions : — Whether the inspiration 
of this wayward and essentially selfish and unfriendly course is to 
be found in the baneful policy of expediency which has characterized 
Lord Palmerston's career; — that fast and loose, hand to mouth 
policy that is wanting in all statesmanlike principles and the 
higher moral considerations and restraints ? — Or, secondly, whether 
as regards America, it is to be found in an essential antagonism 
of principles, — that is to say, on the part of a portion of the British 
people, in a real distrust of the influence of the political example 
of the United States, not in an arrogant self-assertion and an un- 
reasoning hostility ? 

In the former case, our resentment should be mitigated by 
the knowledge that the same policy is applied to Europeans and 
ourselves by turns, and that therein lies compensation in that the 
people of other Countries become estranged from England as 
justly as we do ; in fact, I shall not much misinterpret the opinion 
of the most sagacious observers if I say that in the exercise of this 
policy England is her own greatest enemy. 

In the latter case, we observe a remnant of the bigotry of 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



30 



classes and the elements of a domestic party-question in England 
itself, which qualify an apparent hostility to us as a nation ; yet 
have to deplore the non-application of philosophical principles to 
our relations. 

Reverting to the former hypothesis, let two instances of the 
application of the policy of expediency in Europe suffice for present 
illustration, before citing its application to the United States. 

1 . As to Hungary and Austria the following extract of a 
lengthy article in the London " Economist " of August 17th, 1861. 

" This is the way in which England obtains her great reputation 
on the Continent for political selfishness. When her own liberties 
are concerned, she is vigilant enough and thinks of nothing else 
than the best means of guarding them. But let the question 
refer to the liberties of another nation, and instead of judging the 
case as she would judge her own, the first question she puts is as 
to the expediency of the result for her own interests. If the answer 
to this be not favorable, she puts no futher question at all, — insists 
on viewing the matter in a broad European light, and does anything 
rather than as she would be done by. Thus it is in the case of 
Hungary. Our statesmen think they see great danger to England 
from any encroachment of France or Russia on the Austrian 
Empire. They fear that such an encroachment would follow, if 
once Austria were weakened by the loss of Hungary. And seeing 
this, to all deeper and ulterior questions they resolutely shut their 
eyes. They do not wish to know that Hungary is really in the 
right, — is really acting with greater calmness, judgement, and 
moderation then even England in similar circumstances would 
show. Eor to know this would force them to lend her some 
sympathy and moral aid. They do not wish to lend her any 
moral aid, because they fear the results of her success. Can we 
complain that Continental politicians are never weary of denouncing 
our selfishness, — our different standards of approbation and dis- 
approbation, according as our interests vary ? — can we complain 
that they taunt us with loving Freedom only on self-interested 
grounds ? We deserve such reproaches. We look on with perfect 
indifference at one of the noblest struggles which the world has 
ever seen, — only observing in a quiet aside to the tyrannical 
Government which is involved in it, that we hope she will soon 
be strong and united; — could we say in more explicit terms, " Go 
in and win ? " We cannot but hope that the perusal of M. Deak's 



40 



PAPERS ON THE 



address, arid the report of the demeanor of the Diet in passing it, 
will awaken the conscience of the country, and rouse some of our 
better statesmen into a world of warm sympathy and admiration." 

2. As to the Emperor of the French after the Peace of Villa 
Franca. 

NAPOLEON'S LETTER. 

" The French Emperor has just given to the world another 
illustration of his sagacity and of his magnanimity. His forbear- 
ance toward England since the peace of Villafranca, has excited 
the wonder of all disinterested beholders. The press of Great- 
Britain led on by the London Times, has not ceased to visit him 
with unmeasured abuse ; and as often as the relations of England 
and France have been the theme of discussion in the British 
Parliament, has he been assailed by British statesmen, who have 
attributed to him all manner of ambitious and evil designs. At 
very brief intervals the English nation has been thrown into a 
state of excitement and alarm by the prophecies of their own 
leaders, that the Emperor was preparing to send an army across 
the channel and march upon London, which, by the way, in the 
defenceless condition of the coast and of the city, it would be a 
very easy thing for him to do. It was supposed that the security 
against such an invasion existed in a good understanding between 
the two governments, but the recent speeches of Lord John Russell, 
and of Lord Palmerstion, have revived the apprehension, and 
seemed almost to make it incumbent upon the French Emperor to 
do something to justify the abuse which had been heaped upon 
him. Instead of this, he comes out with a frank, open-hearted 
letter over his own name, declaring that he has no purpose but 
Peace, and especially with England. Most cutting is the adjura- 
tion contained in his letter ; " In heaven's name, let the eminent 
men who are placed at the head of the English Government lay 
aside petty jealousies and unjust mistrusts." 

" It is very easy to charge the Emperor with insincerity, and 
to say that he desires to lull the fears of the English as the pre- 
paration for the accomplishment of such designs as have been 
attributed to him. We do not join in any such suspicions. We 
believe him to be sincere in his declarations. His course in the 
Italian War, to which he alludes, and especially in bringing the 
war to a peaceful issue, by which more has been accomplished for 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



4L 



humanity than could have been by its prosecution, lias our highest 
admiration. 

" We regard the letter, which we publish to-day, as another 
proof of his magnanimity. It was not demanded. It was 
contrary to the custom of Emperors to write such a letter for 
public use. There was nothing in his own circumstances to make 
it necessary. Had he been governed by the ordinary instincts of 
Sovereigns, he would have taken his revenge upon the English 
people by leaving them to their fears, even if he had no hostile 
intention ; but with true generosity, he makes a noble offering to 
secure peace and good feeling between the two nations, and to 
promote the cause of peace and humanity throughout the world." 
— C New York Times." J 

At the period of general distrust of the Emperor in England 
treated of in the foregoing, I was asked, here, my opinion as to 
his Majesty's intentions, by a distinguished Lady no longer in 
China, by a British General, and by the head of one of the older 
British Houses ; and unhesitatingly and emphatically declared that 
I had no doubt whatever of his Majesty's good-faith toward 
England : — the only disquieting circumstances being the inflam- 
matory denunciations of him by the British Press. — 

It is a happy thing, Mr. Editor, to prophecy aright ; and 
thrice happy is it to prophecy Peace aright as I did on this occasion 
and at the period of the Trent affair. But the Avork of many 
Peace-makers may be undone by one malevolent anonymous and 
irresponsible writer. 

3. — And hereat, Mr. Editor, I cite to you a memorable instance 
of the application of this policy to the United States, using for the 
purpose the honest and well-chosen words of Dr. Russell of May 
28th, 1861, then the correspondent of the "Times," which he has 
supplemented by an article from the " Evening Post " of New York, 
as you will see ; and to his full presentation of the subject I shall 
not add a word. — 

" I shall fail in my duties as a faithful correspondent if I 
longer neglect to speak of the growing and, so far as I can judge, 
deep-seated feelings of regret in the popular mind at the manner 
in which England has received the news of the war. This sentiment 
began to manifest itself about a month since, w T hen the public first 
thought that it perceived manifestations of a change in English 
public sentiment towards the South, and it has steadily increased 



42 



PAPERS ON THE 



with each day. I hear from all classes and all sides bitter complaints 
against the Government — more bitter and more heartfelt than the 
passionate outbreaks which you will find in the neswpapers — com- 
plaints that the Government hastened, on the first news of war, to 
give to rebels the support even of a proclamation of neutrality, 
recognizing them as entitled to equal countenance and consideration 
with this government, which has long been on such friendly terms 
with the people of England. Why, it is asked by such persons, 
does the British Government meet the United States, contending 
with persons in rebellion to extend the domain of Slavery, with a 
different and harsher policy than it had for Austria contending 
with Hungary ? What has the United States done that England 
should welcome its disintegration? How would England have 
received a proclamation of neutrality when Ireland or India rebelled? 
Why, then, has the British Cabinet made such hot haste to give a 
status to rebels here ? As I have already said, this feeling is deep- 
seated, wide-spread, and threatening. I can only speak, from my 
own knowledge, of the feeling in the city of New York ; but I hear 
the same accounts from all parts of the interior. I can speak 
positively about New York, that the public mind is, however 
unjustly, rapidly becoming possessed of the idea that England 
sympathises with Southern Slavery in its attacks upon the institu- 
tions of this country ; and that, under this apprehension or misap- 
prehension, the good and kindly feeling which three generations 
of peaceful and friendly relations have created, are vanishing away. 
Indeed, whatever may be the fate of the rebellion, whether successful 
or a failure, and no matter what may be hereafter said in England 
when the relative strength of the two parties is better known, I 
fear that it will be long before the hearty admiration — one might 
almost say affection — for England that existed throughout the 
North two months since, will be restored. I find in the Evening 
Post of to-day an article on this subject, which is so much more 
moderate than those of the other journals that I enclose it in con- 
nexion with what I have said : — 

" According to the law of nations the Government of Great 
Britain has done only what it has the right to do. It is the sole 
judge, for its own purposes, of the status of persons in rebellion 
against a legitimate Government. Whenever, in its opinion, the 
rebels are a society entitled to the rights of war against its enemy, 
it may assume a neutral position, and is then bound, as a neutral 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



43 



Power, to allow impartially to both parties the free exercise of those 
rights which war gives to public enemies against each other." 

" There is, therefore, no actual wrong committed by the 
British Government against the United States ; but that the posi- 
tion which England thus assumes is ill-advised it is not difficult 
to see. Tor a quarter of a century the two nations have been 
growing closer and more mutually dependent friends. Whatever 
the English people may have said or thought of us, nothing is 
plainer than that our people have looked with growing admiration 
at the brave stand of England in Europe, for liberty. Foreign 
writers have assured us again and again that the liberal policy of 
England in continental Europe was only a measure of annoyance 
to her rival Powers, and that when she encouraged Garibaldi in 
Italy or defended Turkey against Russia she was moved simply 
by considerations of interest and not principle. But we have- 
denied the imputation, and our people have been firm in the belief 
that Great Britain was strong because she was right, and that she 
was successful because she acted not from ambitious expediency, 
but from principle. It is not too much to say that a goodly part 
of England's strength has laid in this conviction, that she was a 
great moral Power. It ranged the best sentiment of the world on 
her side. It made her strong in the love and confidence of all 
who believe that nations are moral agents as well as men. It 
made England's welfare a cause of rejoicing to friends of liberty in 
every nation, and her disasters a cause for sorrow. And no more 
fatal blow can be struck at her strength than this which her pre- 
sent Government seems bent upon dealing. 

" It is a mistake which will alienate from her the sympathies 
which she most needs among every people. The part she now 
takes is unworthy of her, and is a blunder alike in policy and in 
principle. She makes haste to recognize the " rights " of certain 
rebels, who have so far achieved absolutely nothing except by the 
tolerance of a Government which has been patient because it is 
strong. She boasts of an " impartiality " which is, in the nature 
of it, partial, and which affords valuable aid to a cause which she 
has fought against for a century. She proves herself forgetful of 
many acts of kindness received from this nation, such as our refusal 
to permit the sailing of privateers against her commerce from our 
port^in the Crimean war, and the sympathy which she received 
from our people in her struggle with the rebellious Sepoys of India. 



PAPERS ON THE 



" And, as a blunder of policy, she gives the cold shoulder to 
a nation whose sympathy and aid she will yet bitterly need, and 
ought not lightly to cast off. She has too many provinces to set 
such an example safely. We did not hasten to grant " rights of 
war " to her Sepoys, though their success was for a time more 
decided than that of our mutineers. But an insurrection in Ireland 
may, at no distant day, make it advisable for us to grant " the 
rights of war " to her rebels there against their enemy ; and what 
may happen in Canada, or in her West India colonies, where she 
holds by so slight a tenure, is a matter for British statesmen to 
consider. 

" The warm sympathies of individual Englishmen we have, 
and shall have, no doubt. But the Goverment speaks for the 
nation, and in this case the British Government has committed the 
nation to an act so ungracious and ill-advised that this people and 
the world will not easily forget it." 

This " thread " is sufficiently extended for one of your issues, 
and the third skein will soon follow. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, 29th February, 1864. 



Editorial comment on the foregoing letter. 

Affixed is E. P. U's. second rejoinder. We have perused it 
carefully and shall give a reply in due course. We find great 
pleasure in inserting his letters, and the more so, that we have 
pinned him to a line of argument which leads to direct issues on 
important points. And it seems to us, that we have driven him 
on to fresh ground, where we shall not hesitate to follow him. It 
appears inexplicable that an American should uphold his own 
Government, and condemn Lord Palmerston. Stranger still that 
E. P. U. should continue to insist that there is any analogy between 
the diplomatic necessities of Europe and North America, 

Interjected Editorial of March dt/i. 

On our fourth page will be found a ludicrous effusion of that 
political mountebank G. E. Train, Avhich we should say will amuse 
our readers. The contrast between the man's style andE. P. U's. 
artful, yet logical dicta, polished yet firm manner of expressing the 
same category of ideas, is decidely instructive. We look on the 



AMEBIC AX QUESTION. 



45 



one as the Clown in the circle, the other as a theological lecturer. 

The occasion of the utterance of Train's last was the " break- 
ing ground " of the projected Pacific Railway, the Atlantic terminus 
of which is fixed to be at Omaha City, Territory of Nebraska. 
The breaking ground was solemnised by order of the President on 
the 2nd December, when naturally there were great rejoicings, and 
among the festivities, Train's last was fired off. 



Editorial comment on the following letter. 

At length the final skein of E. P. U.'s correspondence has 
come to hand, and will be found in our correspondents' column. 
We see that he takes offence at our having placed him in antipo- 
dean contrast to that mountebank G. F. Train. We shall illustrate 
our meaning in our reply. E. P. U. must remember that even 
extremes meet, and we shall show, not only that he and Mr." Train 
are actuated by the same aspirations, but are mentally influenced, 
in very different modes we admit, by the same impulses. 

We think that we have just cause of complaint against E. P. 
U. It is contrary to custom to allow a powerful speaker to break 
off in the middle of his oration and defer the remainder of his 
speech for weeks. Neither is it the custom in newspaper discussion 
for the writer on one side to break off, and silencing his opponent 
by a promise to continue, defer doing so for weeks. Under such 
circumstances, potent yet ex-parte arguments are allowed to 
permeate the mind of the public, producing all the influence which 
they are adapted to work out. 

This has E. P. U. done with considerable effect, and if he 
has not acted designedly in so doing, it is not for the lack of 
earnestness in the cause he advocates, which to him is the cause 
of patriotism. At the same time it must be observed, that should 
he have thus acted designedly, his faith in some of his own argu- 
ments must be shaky. In any event he must be responsible for 
any construction that we may ^elect to put on his unreasonable delay. 



To the Editor of the " Daily Press." 
Mr. Editor. — Some unlooked for impedimenta have prevented 
my taking up the third " skein " of the already rather lengthy 
thread of our discussion upon national amenities until to-day ; and 
that I now discover a fresh gnarl in it is due to your interjection 



46 



PAPERS ON THE 



of the 9th inst., — wherein I might question your judgment as 
much as I do your taste in making me the antipode of Mr. George 
Train in temperament, and his fellow in political doctrines, by call- 
ing him a clown and myself a Theological lecturer, — whilst, if I 
am to attach any further meaning to the use of these figures, it 
reveals a divergence in our views of the subject before us as wide 
as unreasoning levity is removed from serious concern. 

Although I was somewhat suspicious — from your fast and 
loose mode of treating some points — that you, Satyr-like had a 
malicious pleasure in blowing hot and cold by turns, I had thought, 
as I said, that the issue was narrowing between us ; and consider- 
ing that the essential points of the subject had been covered in my 
preceding communications, should have felt myself exonerated 
from more than the notice which courtesy enjoins of the tangible 
exceptions taken by you to my ruling, — adding thereto the acknow- 
ledgment that in international discussions, opinions honestly en- 
tertained and mere assertion of opinion when made in evident good 
faith, must be held to be good reasons in cases of misapprehension 
and misconception, although erroneous in point of fact. 

Such would have been the simple thread of this "skein," 
whose knots had disappeared by anticipation in my sanguine 
horoscope ; but your interjection — like that first Gun in Denmark, 
reported to us soon after — warns me back to Warder's Keep to 
put armor on and visor down. 

Nay, in this age of reason, it does more and better than that ; 
■ — it recalls me to first principles as the proper basis of international 
relations. 

And hereat I see our divergent point lies, in the present, as 
it did in the former discussion about the Alabama ; — your sarcastic 
banter upon the sober tinge of my thought reminding me of the 
radical difference then shown in our estimates of her commander, 
whose individuality, so elaborately painted by you, I have not 
sufficiently recognized before : — A difference to which you give 
point in a direction that I might well have wished you to take, by 
placing him in the Temple of Fame alongside of Garibaldi. 

Enamored, indeed, must you have been of that Southern 
Goddess of Liberty which Punch * used to represent brandishing 
a Cat o 'nine tails over a strangely pale-faced Slave Mother with 
infant in arms, that you should place Garibaldi within her portals ! 

* By the bye, what has washed that high-colouriug pencil so clean ? 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



47 



Would his heroic soul — as chivalric as pure — not spurn . the 
thought of association with Raphael Semmes ? 

Let his own words, (though I cannot reproduce them here), 
repeated as they w T ere in the liberal Journals of Europe, respecting 
the American struggle, answer with the clear clarion sound inhaled 
of the pure air of his own home ; — and his happy dream of a 
united Italy replace the hideous night-mare that vexes Secessia ! 

Or say you that you meant the converse of this and claimed 
a place in the historical Temple of Fame for Raphael Semmes ; — 
that Temple on Alpine height of the World's renown which stands 
over against the Temple Infamous ? — A pedestal for him by the 
side of the Worthies of all time ? — Yes, in your distorted vision 
his figure is no less than this. 

You seem to behold around his head a halo of romance and glory 
and your fancy paints his ship as " in perfect discipline — a pattern of 
" a war vessel ; — he is a Patriot, a Gentleman, a great Sea Captain," 
in your eyes, " — and, next to Garibaldi, the Hero of the day." 

You might with more reason have compared him to Captain 
Kidd, who was scarcely more recreant to the principles of his own 
age ; and the admirers of Paul Jones might have pardoned your 
suggesting a parallel in the career of that renowned Captain, — al- 
though it would have reminded them of the marked contrast 
between them as to the essential points of legality and personal 
heroism ; — Jones not having sailed from Prance until after the 
declaration of War against that Power by England, and having 
always sought for the national vessels of War instead of avoiding 
them, to say nothing of his famous victory over the " Serapis." — ■ 

Such comparisons you might rightly have made ; but that 
you should couple with Semmes' the name of Garibaldi, — the man 
of all others of our modern era whose character is formed on the 
models of the ancient Pleroes, is to desecrate it ! — 

What has Raphael Semmes done that he should thus feed on 
the manna of the Immortals ? — 

My letter of January 15th recounts his career: But, 

1 . You say that he is a Patriot. 

The law says he is doubly a Traitor : — A Traitor to the Go- 
vernment of the United States both as a Citizen and as an Officer 
who has violated his oath as such ; and a Traitor to his own State 
of Maryland, where he was born, whence he was appointed to the 
United States Navy, and of which he is still a Citizen. 



48 



PAPERS ON THE 



2. You say that he is a Gentleman, and has observed all 
national amenities and local regulations. 

Does his conduct in setting at defiance International Law and 
the Municipal Laws of England while living under her protection, 
or his subsequent flagrant violations of the Sovereignty of Portugal 
and of Brazil, evince the sense of honor of a Gentleman or the 
decorous conduct of an Officer? — 

Or does his ornamenting his Cabin with the numerous 
chronometers and sextants of the Captains of Merchant ships whom 
he has despoiled, and his putting men, women and children into 
open boats on the Sea, under the Sun of the tropics or elsewhere, 
evince gentlemanly, not to say humane feelings ? — 

3. You say that he is a great Sea Captain and a Hero second 
only to Garibaldi. — 

If to go prowling about the Seas in search of helpless Mer- 
chant ships, burning them by night to attract others ; and fleeing 
from one Sea to another to avoid the National Ships of War, con- 
stitutes a great Sea Captain, he is one ; but of a new order of 
greatness. 

And he is a Hero, if his sole naval combat and exploit, — 
wherein, just after dark, on being chased and hailed by the U. S. 
S. Hatteras off Galveston, he replied that he was Her Britannic 

Majesty's ship , whereupon Captain Blake of the Hatteras 

said he would send a boat on board of him, and in the act of doing 
so had a whole broadside thrown into his vessel by the Alabama, 
but continued to fight bravely against such a cowardly foe, although 
the Hatteras was only a frail ferry or canal boat fitted out hurriedly 
for blockade purposes and in every respect unfit to cope with the 
Alabama : 

— If by such a cowardly stratagem as this, by which he sank 
the miserable ferry boat, it being his sole encounter with a national 
vessel, and in which his oavii suffered severely, he is constituted a 
Hero second only to Garibaldi ; — • 

Then has a sense of chivalrous honor ceased to be a charac- 
teristic of Officers and Gentlemen ; then, indeed, must the Heroes 
descend from their pride of place ! 

But this renewed glance at the startling juxtapositions in your 
figure painting is episodic ; and I revert to the exception that you 
seem to make to the seriousness with which I regard the general 
subject of the relations of our Countries, to ask you if in point of 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



49 



fact this very objection does not mark the difference between us, 
shewing that you argue from superficial indications instead of 
probing to latent principles of thought and action. 

Why — Mr. Editor — there would be no end to the War of 
words between our Countries, until indeed it came to one of blows, 
if we went on charging each other with being the aggressor in 
provocation and from recrimination to invective, until our blood 
got so heated that all the interchanges of Ice and Yarn ceased to 
keep us cool or bind us to peace. 

So far as these manifestations arise from misconception, so far 
as they are spontaneous — not factitious and assumed for effect,— 
they are assuring signs of a mutual dread of war, and like the first 
indications of a reconciliation between an estranged husband and 
wife. But with short-sighted perversity the Times and its coad- 
jutors strive to enforce their theory of the danger of the example 
of republicanism and of the preponderance of American power, by 
systematic denunciation, whereby to engender national repugnance 
and check the tides of emigration and capital to the United States, 
although quite conscious as political economists and champions of 
free trade that they are illogically striving against irresistible 
tendencies and the spirit of the age. 

Mr. Editor. — principles are universal ; and it is because the 
influence of a perverted medium is not only mischievous and de- 
trimental to both countries, but demoralizing of the moral sense of 
whole peoples that the conduct of the Times and its fellows should 
be held up to reprobation. 

What subject, then, than this which concerns the welfare of 
nations is more worthy of serious consideration ? 

You liken my treatment of it to that of a Theological lecturer ; 
but I do not see what it has to do with Theology, save that ethics 
should be the basis of all systems. 

The question in all controversies is who gave the provocation ; 
— who of the two were most prone to War ? — This, because it is 
the greater glory of our age that the naked ambition of neither 
Nation or Sovereign is tolerated longer. 

Well, as respects the United States, this is very easily answer- 
ed, since with neither Army or Navy of the least magnitude before 
the Rebellion, it could not have purposed aggression ; and in point 
of fact I remember that Lord Palmerston had shewn such a 
disposition to take advantage of our unarmed position, by sending 



50 



PAPERS ON THE 



large fleets off our Coasts, that our Minister in 1 850 told him frankly 
that Americans were so much " chips of the old block " as to 
resent bullying. 

But to bring this question to the palpable test within our 
immediate cognizance, let us regard the relations of the two Coun- 
tries at the period of the rupture with the South, and trace the rise 
of the War fever in England to its culminating point in the Trent 
affair, — at which last I see you except my ruling. 

What, then, was the state and tendency of feeling in the two 
Countries toward each other at that period ? 

Although the captiousness of the Times was still vigilant 
enough to give zest to any of the minor questions arising from 
contact at home or in these distant Countries, as you may be 
reminded by the herewith letter that I wrote in 1859, (which I 
leave to you to attach at foot or not, in illustration, as yon please,) 
— its influence for evil had been so far neutralized or its temper 
mollified by the force of circumstances and the course of events, that 
unquestionably the general aspect of the relations of the two Peo- 
ples was friendly ; and so far as the Northern States were concerned 
these pleasing relations had recently been cemented by the cordial 
reception given to the Prince of Wales ; — the only stain upon this 
burnished shield of our national courtesy — let it be scornfully mark- 
ed here — having been inflicted by one of the devotees around that 
Temple Infamous wherein stands a pedestal for Raphael Semmes. 

Of this state of feeling the letter of Dr. Russell, the Corres- 
pondent of the Times and the thoughtful statement which he 
quoted from the New York Evening Post, incorporated into my 
letter of the 29th ulto., convincingly certify ; but I now introduce 
one of the highest local authorities in China, whose testimony is 
emphatically to the same effect. 

I allude to the Lord Bishop of Victoria (Hongkong) who, in 
going to England a few years ago on a visit, proceeded hence to 
California and thence though the most of the United States 
wherein he spent some time, and during his sojourn addressed the 
annual Convention of the Episcopal Church at New York, in 1SG0, 
the Bishops of several of the States and a very large concourse of 
Clergymen and other citizens being present, as follows : — 

" The Bishop of Victoria, in rising to address the Convention, 
made a few preparatory remarks in grateful acknowledgment of 
the kind invitation of their respected Bishop, and the courtesy of 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



51 



the Christian brethren then present in -voting him an honorary 
seat in their Convention. He had everywhere observed the most 
gratifying proofs of the respect, friendship and good feeling which 
animated the citizens of the United States towards the mother 
country. In every railway-car, and on board every steamboat in 
their magnificent rivers, an Englishman was received with marked 
interest and respect, and an English clergyman met universal 
cordiality and welcome. In the profound and even affectionate 
veneration of Americans for the virtuous qualities and exalted 
character of the British Queen, in the deep and thrilling tones of 
cordial interest with which they welcomed to the American shores 
that young man, that Royal Prince, who in the course of nature 
seems likely to inherit the glorious dignities and weighty responsi- 
bilities of the British crown, and for whom, he doubted not, many 
prayers were offered up by Christians on this continent, he read 
plain and palpable signs of this wide-spread mutual friendship and 
feeling of international sympathy and esteem. Still more unequi- 
vocal were the marks of cordial respect accorded to a bishop from the 
elder sister Church. He begged to tender to the Right Reverend the 
President, and to each member of the assemblage before him, his re- 
cognition of the welcome, and of the honourable attentions paid to 
the English Church, of which he was on the present occasion an 
humble representative. Among British Christians there was a reci- 
procity of this feeling of intercommunion between the two Episcopal 
Churches. English Churchmen viewed with interest the material 
dovelopment of the United States, the indomitable energy of national 
will by which the forest was subdued, the wilderness reclaimed, and 
their mighty continent was overspread with populous cities, and 
covered with its network of railways. But above all they rejoiced in 
the proofs of the growing influence of the younger sister Church, the 
multiplication of her churches, the extension of her dioceses, the in- 
crease in her clergy, and the vitality of her ministrations. One in 
orgin and descent, one in language and laws, one in their common li- 
turgical formularies of faith, one in their common maintenance of 
evangelical truth, combined with primitive order and apostolic rule, 
■ — both Churches were bound together by the closest ties, and formed 
two great bulwarks of Protestant Christianity throughout the world." 

And here I stop a day or two, as I find the disentangling 
process requires more space than one of your issues affords. 

E. P. U. 



52 



PAPERS ON THE 



POST-SCRIPT. 

As I am not so brazen as to offer my old wares without a 
fresh burnishing or japaning, I leave to you, Mr. Editor, to include 
the following crosses upon the Japan shield of the " Times " among 
the illustrations of its characteristic assumptions, or not, as may 
please yourself, attaching this note in exculpation of myself from 
egotism, if you do so. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, March 22nd, 1864. 

Sir. — The " Times," with a fertility of resource that almost 
anticipates public curiosity, has recently furnished to its readers a 
series of articles ostensibly designed to illustrate the present tran- 
sition phase of politics in China and Japan preparatory to their 
induction into the comity of Nations ; ancLthe course of them has, 
with much bestowal of just praise of Lord Elgin and much omission 
of just desert of Sir Michael Seymour, launched arrows, not a little 
poisoned, at the American Minister to China ; — whilst in generaliz- 
ing its acknowledgments both of the courtesy and services of the 
American Consul General to Japan in a manner to ignore his just 
merits, it gives point to its own reflections upon the American 
Naval Commander in Chief by " smartly imagining " a fictitious 
basis for its inordiante appropriation of credit to England for the 
negotiations at Jeddo, to the relative disparagement of American 
diplomacy. 

We regard not the China-won laurels of Lord Elgin with 
jaundiced eyes, — we rather rejoice in them as emblematical of the 
common gain of Christendom ; — but if like a General flushed with 
victory in one field, he Avent to Japan to appropriate the spoils of 
a battle already gained by the moral intrepidity and presevering 
vigilance of our Countrymen, and in the height of his advantage 
displaces alike the early trophies of the indomitable Perry and the 
green wreaths of the patient Harris, that his own standards may 
fill the eyes of an admiring World, Ave shall deny him the posses- 
sion of what Ave are fain to attribute to him, — that magnanimous 
sense of justice Avhich is the characteristic of great minds. 

We shall remind him that after Perry had — with consummate 
tact and resolute constancy — overborne the Avail of two centuries 
formation, the first person acquiescent in its attempted re-erection 
was a British Admiral ; and yet, that, by subsequent persevering 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



53 



peaceful efforts, Mr. Harris had again turned the tide of civilization 
against it with effect and finally consummated the work so admir- 
ably begun by his predecessor, — so that when his Lordship arrived 
at Simoda it wanted little more to assure him of success than the 
assumption of a spirit of happy audacity and the services of Mr. 
Harris' Interpreter. 

We pause, however, to say that we are very far from attribu- 
ting to the Noble Earl the inspiration of these depreciatory "leaders" 
of the Times — so emphatically mis-leaders as they are of public 
opinion ; — his whole career disproves the supposition as his language 
in Parliament and on public occasions in America contradicts it, 
or we have widely interpretej&cl the one and much misread the 
record of the other. 

But the ever-vigilant "Times " — that with its hundred arms 
compels all the ends of the Earth to tribute, and that has become 
the World's Herald, — we would it were more cosmopolitan in 
spirit. 

The change would prevent the exhibition of a deal of ill 
humor and much mutual recrimination, nay, it would tend to con- 
solidate the friendships of peoples and to conserve the peace of 
the World. 

It is quite true that it plays such a deep game of " fast and 
loose" with America that we can hardly judge from the target of 
one day to what point the arrows of the next will be directed 
or how much poison their barbs will bear ;■ — thus ever tantalizing, 
even if sometimes amusing in the jaunty air of its effrontery in 
protesting innocence and transferring the blame of a quarrel to 
American shoulders, it is often rather the caterer to a morbid crav- 
ing of reproach to republican institutions than the intelligent reflex 
of sound public opinion. 

If it abuses its great opportunities and perverts its high mission 
as the leading Press of the World, let the Nations mark its course 
and the evil will sooner or later be upon its own head. At present 
it concerns us to rectify its perverted record of history in respect 
only to Japan ; — the questions between the two Legations, as to 
the action of Mr. Reed in China, having been left by the public 
discussion of it, in the " Times " upon one hand and the " New- 
York Times " on the other, in a state to necessitate the notice, 
directly or indirectly, of one or the other of the respective Chiefs. 

First, then, of the mis-leaders of the " Times " of November 



54 



PAPERS ON THE 



1st and 3rd, — which are so saturated with the miction of self-glo- 
rification that we can hardly make an extract of them that shall 
miry combine its essence, — the following portions may serve our 
immediate purpose of initiating inquiry into the relative claims of 
England and America to the credit of "rending the curtain of 
ages." — 

1st. — In the editorial of November 1st we read : — 
" Fortune favoured the boldness of the enterprise, and Ameri- 
can astuteness helped us. Lord Elgin reached Nagasaki on the 
3rd of August, and found no one there but some Japanese under- 
lings and some Dutch officials, who naturally gave him small hopes. 
Thence he went, staggering through one of the tremendous gales 
that vex these seas, to the wretched harbour of Simoda, where the 
Americans are in power, and at this place he for the first time 
discovered the workings of the echoes of his own doings on the 
Peiho. It seems that as soon as the Tien-tsin Treaty was arranged, 
the American Commodore rushed off to Japan to take advantage 
of the consternation certain to be created by the first news of 
recent events in the Peiho. It was smartly imagined. He found 
at Simoda the American Consul-General just returned from Jeddo, 
whither he had been upon a six months' mission, vainly importu- 
ning for some commercial privileges. The Commodore immediately 
took him on board his ponderous steamer the Powhattan, and 
steered right away for Kanagawa, a station well known to the 
American men of war since Commodore Perry's time, about 15 
miles below the capital city of Jeddo. Terrible stories and fright- 
ful anticipations had for some time possessed the minds of the 
Japanese. Japan, like other countries of ancient institutions, has 
its conservative and progressive parties. The Prince of Boringo 
had stood stoutly for the ancient Japanese constitution and no 
foreign competition. But when the American ship of war appear- 
ed, and when the American version of the warlike operations in 
China circulated, a strong feeling gained ground in favour of the 
progressive party. Prince Boringo retired, and Prince Birsutook 
his place. Under the new Administration Mr. Harris, the Consul- 
General, was admitted to an interview with the Emperor : ports 
were opened, and commercial tariffs agreed upon pretty much as 
is set forth in the statement we borrow from the North China 
Herald. When Lord Elgin arrived at Simoda he found Mr. Harris 
in high spirits at having completed this Treaty, and the prece- 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



dent gave him an opportunity whereof he sadly stood in need. 
We must here — having recently spoken in terms of complaint to 
our American friends for sending their silliest men upon important 
Embassies — acknowledge that Mr. Harris acted throughout these 
transactions with a frankness and courtesy worthy of the represent- 
ative of a great friendly Power. Mr. Harris acted like a man 
who was strong in his OAvn knowledge of the interests of his country. 
Lord Elgin departed at once for the anchorage below the capital, 
where he found the American, and also the Russia war steamers. 
The neutrals had been quick to scent the game from afar ; they had 
run a race against us to gather not only the spoils won by our arms, 
but even the contributions to be exacted by the terror of our deeds. 
Beyond this anchorage of Kanagawa were rocks and whirlpools 
and perils innumerable, all faithfully deposed to by Japanese pilots. 
Captain Sherard Osborn, who has the reputation of being con- 
fident, and not unreasonably confident, in his own seamanship, 
believed in none of these things. Steaming over the anchorage 
he held on up the Bay of Jeddo, and city, which slowly unrolled 
itself in the north-west angle of the gulf, he pursued his course, un- 
deterred by a full gale of wind, until he could cast anchor within 
gunshot of a series of well constructed batteries, which run across 
the shoals facing a portion of the city. Lord Elgin's well judged 
confidence in his captain was thus rewarded by a position which, 
considering he had to deal with Asiatics, insured his success. It 
was a bold move made at a timely moment, for he could have clone 
nothing at a distance. Since Mr. Harris obtained his Treaty 
there had been a reactionary movement in Jeddo, directed by the 
independent Princes and hereditary nobles. They had ousted the 
Minister who signed the Treaty, and Prince Boringo ruled again. 
But the apparition of the British steam frigates Furious and Re- 
tribution, intruding even upon the sacred seclusion of the capital, 
spread consternation throughout the camp of the obstructives. 
We made no menaces and used no threats, but we fear there was 
something like the pressure of a force which was not altogether 
moral put upon these gentle Japanese. Our excuse must be that 
if the Americans had obtained concessions upon the strength of the 
terror created by the roar of the lion it would have been hard that 
the lion should get nothing on his own account." 

2nd. — And in the editorial of November 3rd as follows : — 
" We don't stand exclusiveness. We hold that the world is 



56 



PAPERS ON THE 



made for us all ; and so we have gradually egged on and finally 
pushed our way close up to the City of Jeddo, through rows of 
junks, abreast of green batteries, and dropped our anchors Avhere 
barbarian ship was never seen before. We took advantage of a 
panic, and did it with a rush. While we were concluding matters 
up the Peiho the Russian and American Plenipotentiaries were off 
with breathless haste to Nagasaki, to reap the first fruits of our 
harvest. They got start enough to get all they wanted, and give 
time for a reaction. However, Lord Elgin was not far behind ; 
and when he came up he capped the achievements of his brother 
Plenipotentiaries, and got for them more than they had ventured 
to ask for themselves. 

" So, with the " Open Sesame," of a little resolution, we have 
rent the curtain of ages. Captain Osborn reports that there must 
be a channel, and up they all steam. The mountain side opens, 
and European eyes rest on objects never seen before but on cups 
and saucers, and never to be seen, as many believed, till the con- 
summation of all things, the Millennium, or the great mustering 
for the battle of Armageddon. Lord Elgin went ahead; the 
bigger ships followed the day after; they bring a handsome 
present with them, which they wisely judge worthier to be deliver- 
ed in the presence of an Imperial city than at a distant out port ; 
they come with peaceful bearing, except that they heed no signals ; 
they receive the courteous Japanese officials with equal courtesy ; 
but the spectacle tallies so exactly with the terrible reports from 
the opposite shores of China that in a moment Japan throws away 
its Palladium of perpetual isolation." 

Now, what was this advance beyond the American and Russian 
ships lying at Kanagawa better than a imitation of Commodore 
Terry's similar movement and breaking the line of the cordon of 
Government boats when first penetrating toward the head of the 
bay of Jeddo? — What but an imitation so palpable as to suggest 
a comparison in favor of the moral heroism of the American 
Pioneer ? 

But we now purpose to deal with facts, rather than to suggest 
inferences ; and proceed to disprove the statements purporting to 
embody the material points whereupon the " Times " so compla- 
cently — not to say arrogantly — founds the claim of the roaring 
Lion to the well garnered harvest of the 'peaceful, philosophical, 
husbandman, in terms which had they been used by our countrymen 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



57 



would have run the risk of being denounced by it as the grandilo- 
quent assumptions of American self-conceit. — 

First, then, so far from it being " smartly imagined " by the 
American Commodore that by rushing from the Pei-ho a new Treaty 
mighty be wrested from the terrors of the Japanese, inspired by the 
Lion's roaring in that river, we have it from the highest authority : — 
1st. — That His Excellency the Commodore had not the most 
remote idea that Mr. Harris or our Government contemplated 
a new Treaty with Japan ; — that he went there under an ex- 
press order of the Navy Department and for a totally different 
purpose. 

2nd. — And most material : — that Mr. Harris had concluded his 
Treaty long prior to Commodore Tatnall's arrival at Simoda 
and, if not prior to, near the period when Lord Elgin left 
Shanghae for the Pei-ho, in April. 

Eor some political reason of a domestic character^rospeetive 
date was affixed to the Treaty, which was the 1st of September, 
copies being held by the respective parties and a sub and secret 
Treaty signed and sealed by all the parties binding them to the 
execution of the main Treaty on the day of its date. Both had 
been concluded long before Commodore Tatnall reached Simoda 
and long before the movements in the Gulf of Pechili. 

It will be seen, therefore, that Ave must attribute to the 
favorable impressions left by Commodore Perry and the diplomatic 
ability of Mr. Consul-General Harris, rather than to the echo of 
the Guns of the British Fleet at the Pei-ho, the effectual opening- 
up of Japan. 

Undoubtedly upon reading the two Treaties at Simoda, the 
Commodore suggested an earlier public execution of the main one 
than had been designated, in view of the not improbable visits of 
other Negotiators and the consequent possible questioning of Mr. 
Harris' claim to priority ; and, accordingly, he conveyed the Con- 
sul-General to Kanagawa, where in his presence the main Treaty 
was fully executed by both parties, the prospective date erased and 
that of the day — July 29th 1858 — substituted, — when the sub or 
secret Treaty was destroyed, also in presence of Commodore 
Tatnall. 

But beside these Treaties, Mr. Harris had another tangible 
proof of his success in inspiring confidence and good-will in the first 
real autograph of the Emperor himself that ever left Japan — it 



58 



PAPERS ON THE 



being an autograph letter to the President of the United-States 
actually signed by the Emperor ; whereas others had been signed 
only by the Ministers. 

It would, we think, be difficult to find in the contemporary 
reflections of any other periodical of the day so many smart 
imaginings to the disparagement of another Nation's claims as are 
ingeniously — not to say disingenuously — set before the World in 
these two editorials of the leading Journal of Christendom — from 
whose columns are hereafter to be culled the materials of History, 
— save the mark ! 

We are, 
Sir, 

With apologies for so considerable a trespass upon your space, 
Your obedient Servants, 

Several Americans. 

January, 31s/ 1859. 

Macao, 22nd March, 1864. 



To the Editor of the "Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor, — My letter of the 22nd closed with a felicitous 
sketch by the Lord Bishop of Victoria of the happy intercourse of 
the British and American people in 1860 ; and as the previously 
presented touches of those able limners Dr. Russell of the Times 
and Mr. Bryant of the New York Evening Post may be taken as 
the fuller embodyment and expression of the subject, we have a 
complete picture of the relations of the two Countries at the mo- 
ment when sinister shadows began to fall across it. 

Whence came these shadows and what measure of evil did 
they portend ? — 

These were the questions which every thoughtful Englishman, 
as every American, asked himself. 

Who shall doubt now, — on regarding the whole scene retros- 
pectively, — that primarily and essentially their origin is to be found 
in the habitual policy of expediency, to which I have already allu- 
ded, whereof Lord Palmerston is the exponent and ' Stands Chal- 
lenger ' gainst all the World for its perfection ' ? 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



59 



A policy, of which I will only say, — since I will not pd/sume 
to " carry the War into Africa," — that, as directed toward America, 
it thrives but fitfully upon fallacies, and is destined in the future 
as in the past to betray its adherents, sooner or later, in despite of 
the splendid Imperial power behind it, — since nothing can cohn 
pensate the loss of moral force. — ■ 

Nothing is clearer than that the British Government made 
unseemly haste, if it did not assume a dominating spirit, in recog- 
nizing the Rebels as belligerents before the arrival of His Excel- 
lency, Mr. Adams in London ; — nothing clearer than that Her 
Majesty's Ministers regarded rather the relative military progress 
and prospects of the contending forces than the fundamental prin- 
ciples at stake, as the rule of their conduct. — 

And it is equally clear that these precedents are fraught with 
a retributive power of harm to England that will vindicate in the 
future my impeachment of Lord Palmerston's statesmanship. 

The false step — as fatal for Nations as for individuals — once 
made required justification ; support it must have, — factitious, if 
real would betray the cloven foot. 

Hence one fallacy after another. At one time Mr. Seward 
was the inveterate enemy of England ; — at another, the mob ruled 
America, — that terrible democratic mob " composed of the scum 
of Europe." 

And to these industriously disseminated hallucinations was 
added all the pent-up venom of the scavengers of the press, as any- 
thing savory fell in their way, — their appetites whetted by the fast 
imposed while their minds were held in awe by the magnitude of 
the impending struggle. — 

What more cowardly' — more exasperating than this punic 
faith at such a period of national distress ? — 

Thus arose the dust found in the eyes of America's friends 
in England when the Trent affair occurred. Fortunately, the most 
natural action on such occasions is to rub the eyes, for soon 
through all this baneful dust thrown up by the enemy the light 
began to appear and the truth loomed up, — as it always will after 
an Eclipse of Faith, whole and beautiful to behold. 

And the reconciliation that followed was of the prompting of 
the heart of the two peoples, which down deep in its recesses al- 
ways says " Let us love one another," — but is constantly hindered 
in its strivings to reach the light, by evil spirits ! — 



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I must, however, retrace ray steps a little here to meet you, 
for though I reached my ecstacy by the most natural of sensation- 
al sequences, I have need to justify my elation by the testimony 
of impartial witnesses of the moral victory that America gained in 
the Trent affair. — 

Witness, then, the following from the London Daily News : — 

" The Slavery Party in England. — Few things have excited 
more just and natural surprise, not only in America, but in the 
more enlightened countries of Europe, than the perverse sympathies 
and partialities which a certain section of the upper and educated 
classes in this country have displayed towards the rival parties in 
the great civil conflict now waging on the other side of the Atlantic. 
Every one who has looked into the question knows perfectly well 
that Slavery is at the bottom of the whole struggle. The actual 
policy of the Republican party which triumphed at the last presi- 
dential election was that of preventing the forcible extension of 
Slavery into the new territories of the States. While carefully 
respecting the existing rights of the Slave States, and providing 
ample guarantees for the protection of their property in the Terri- 
tories, the Republican party refused to allow the forcible extension 
and establishment of Slavery in the virgin lands of the West. 
This was a strictly temperate, legal, and pacific policy, and its 
operation would have been wholly in favour of social morality and 
political freedom. The South, however, at once resolved that no 
check should be interposed to the forcible extension of its peculiar 
and accursed institution. In such a conflict any intelligent 
foreigner who knew anything of the English character, or of the 
history of this country during the present century, would have no 
difficulty in deciding on which side the sympathies of Englishmen 
of all ranks and classes would be enlisted." 

" The steamer America, which was to leave New York on New 
Year's day, and is due at Queenstown on Monday next, the 13th, 
will certainly inform us either that Lord Lyons has left Washing- 
ton, or that Messrs. Mason and Slidell are given up. The general 
intelligence by the Europa presents to us the picture of an extreme- 
ly susceptible people in a state of high excitement. There is 
no room now for the distinction between the nation and the mob. 
Men of various classes and different stages of culture and experience 
are of course variously affected by it, but all are amazed and most 
are indignant. There is nothing in our just demands of satisfaction 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



61 



for the honour of our insulted flag that can explain this, nothing 
in their matter or the manner in which they have been preferred. 
But the real character of the proceedings of our Government has been 
obscured and, perverted, not by their press, we are bound to say, but 
by a portion of ours, and that portion which loves to vaunt itself on 
superiority to the press of the Republic. The American people, as 
we see them at this moment, are under the madden ing influence of all 
the malevolent assumptions, and all the vulgar taunts which some of 
our newspapers think they can employ, and yet preserve their title 
to be supercilious about the " mob" It would be childish to look 
closely into the language which a people holds when it is almost 
delirious with vexation. The Americans cannot just now do justice 
to our procedure. They are not calm enough to reflect that if the 
English people toere as selfish and sordid as some of their journals, 
our national policy would have been very different from that of which 
the whole world is a witness. But we may learn how the relations 
of free nations are poisoned, perhaps for ages, when, as in this case, 
every art has been employed to make a just demand assume the ap- 
pearance of a brutal aggression. Those who have been busy at this 
kind of work, as they read the Europa's mail may rub their hands 
with fiendish glee. If they do not gain their immediate end, if the 
present occasion of war is avoided — as the determination of the 
American public seems to make certain — it will be owing to the fact, 
confounding as it is to the calumniators of popular institutions, that 
the United States never had a Government so independent of the 
mob, because so strongly supported by th e citizens, as it has at pre- 
sent, and because even at the height of an unexampled excitement 
the nation preserves its power of self-restraint. All the voices which 
reach us from America exclaim that every sacrifice must and will be 
made for peace!' — ( 'Daily News.) 

And this from the London Herald as to Mr. Seward, from 
Mr. Astor Bristed, a graduate of Oxford or Cambridge in England. 

A Voice from the North. — We have received the following, 
dated New York, December 20th : — 

" Amid the storm of English accusations which has fairly 
overwhelmed us, the most singular is the charge against Mr. 
Seward of wishing to involve this country in a war with England. 
Of all the strange delusions about us that somebody has put into 
your heads this is the very wildest. Mr. Seward is not a man to 



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declare Avar against the republic of San Marino. I presume there 
are few things in the world which he likes less than war. He 
ignored our civil conflict till the knowledge of it Avas all but cram- 
med down his throat at the sword's point ; and as to foreigners, 
his sole anxiety has been to keep out of their way, and keep them 
out of ours, and give them no pretext for meddling with us." 

And these most valuable, because evidently well-considered 
comments of the French press. 

(From Galignani's (Paris) Messenger of January 11th 1862.) 

•• Several of the Paris journals express their satisfaction at 
the Trent difficulty, and congratulate the United States on having 
acted with so much moderation and self-command. The feeling 
of our contemporaries inclines more towards America than England 
in the matter, and some of those journals even go the length of 
imputing to the British Cabinet a desire to fasten a quarrel on 
America on any pretext, however futile. Such a supposition we 
conceive to be completely unfounded, first, because England has 
enough to do at home with her manufactures and commercial un- 
dertakings to render a war anything but popular; and next, 
because the American nation is not one that any Power whatever 
would choose to encounter unless urged to such a course by some 
strong necessity. We subjoin a few extracts from the articles of 
which we speak, commencing with one from the Debuts. — 

" The outburst of joy which has taken place in London on 
the receipt of the news, and the testimony of which is brought us 
by the English journals, shews to what a degree England dreaded 
war, after having adopted perhaps too precipitately, the very sys- 
tem of conduct calculated to render it inevitable. England not 
only uses the language of satisfied national pride, but breathes 
freely like a man who finds a heavy weight removed from his 
breast. The Post affects a little coldness and diplomatic haught- 
iness. ' We hope,' it says, ' that this tardy reparation has been 
accompanied by the apologies demanded ; but the Times, that 
echo of public opinion, treats the question of excuses as one of 
little value ; and, being content to see the nightmare of a maritime 
war dispelled, is disposed to pass over them.' 

The Temps expresses itself in these terms : — 

" Honour to tbe Government of the United States as well as 
to public opinion in America ! To admit the necessities of a situa- 
tion, and to conform to it with a manly resignation, is a proof of 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



63 



wisdom which is not yet very common among nations and Govern- 
ments. The American Government, in releasing the prisoners, has 
doubtless done nothing more than apply the doctrines which it has 
constantly professed, and, at the same time, it wards off a great 
danger. To do so has not the less required great strength of 
mind, great moderation, and great command over itself. 

We have faith in that strength, in that moderation, and in 
that self-command. If, moreover, President Lincoln wishes to 
crown his work, and restore to the incident of the Trent its true 
and general signification, he has only to solemnly consider the 
remonstrances of England as an abandonment of the old maritime 
policy of England." 

" The satisfaction of the moment is for England ; the real 
triumph is in every way for the United States, and for the cause 
of the freedom of the seas. The precedent is destined to be deep- 
ly engraved in the memory of nations. It has been said that the 
English Government hold in reserve other motives and other pre- 
texts for war. That may be possible, but she can now be defied 
to make use of them, as public opinion would forbid it. Already 
divided, before the victory which the Cabinet of Washington has 
just gained over itself, public feeling will become unanimous. If 
we are not mistaken, a great change in favour of the United States 
is about to take place, not only in England, but in every country. 
This incident was perhaps necessary to make the Old World feel 
by what bonds the United States were connected with it. The 
South had considered the capture of its plenipotentiaries as equi- 
valent to a victory ; it will not be mistaken in regarding their 
release as an omen of its defeat." 

The Opinion Nationale employs the following language : — 

" The affair is now settled, and we may henceforth sleep in 
peace. John Bull and Brother Jonathan are at last reconciled, 
and' we might perhaps give way to enthusiasm on the subject, if 
the insidious question : ' is the reconciliation sincere ? did not 
suddenly present itself to our mind. We should hesitate to an- 
swer in the affirmative. The Federal Cabinet has made a con- 
cession for which it must have felt great repugnance, but it saw 
all the danger of plunging into a war with England under present 
circumstances. It has therefore swallowed the affront, but feels 
it too keenly to pardon England for inflicting it. The fire 
smoulders ; some day or other, we shall see the flames burst forth. 



64 



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But is England, which has obtained so great a triumph for her 
self-love, satisfied with it, after all ? The fact is open to doubt. 
The British Cabinet is suspected, not without some plausible 
grounds, of wishing to force a war upon the United States ; and 
the language of the principal English journals would almost 
induce us to suppose that the liberation of Messrs. Mason 
and Slidell has in reality caused disappointment rather than 
pleasure." 

The following is from the Steele : 

" The despatches which announce the favourable solution of 
the conflict between England and the United States, have produced 
general satisfaction in Paris. The prospect of a war which would 
necessarily lead to the most serious complications, would fill with 
mourning all those who, like us, would wish to see all nations 
proceed regularly and unshackled towards liberty and prosperity. 
In accepting the consequences of the act of Captain Wilkes, the 
Cabinet of Washington would have uselessly compromised the 
future of the two hemispheres and the cause of the American 
Union. To yield under such circumstances is, on its part, a proof 
of strength rather than of weakness. It renders homage to the 
principles which it has itself defended for so many years, and 
yields to the wishes expressed so unanimously by the Eurpoean 
Governments. All had adopted the arguments so clearly developed 
by M. Thouvenel ; all condemned the conduct of the Command- 
ant of the San Jacinto as contrary to the law of nations ; but what 
is remarkable is that no power, in presenting considerations on an 
isolated fact, called in question the good faith, the intelligence, 
and the patriotism of the Government of the American Republic. 
It has rallied round it sympathies which were about departing ; 
and Messrs. Mason and Slidell set at liberty by its orders, may, 
without danger to it resume their voyage to Europe." 

Well, Mr. Editor, is this result of the " Trent " affair a triumph 
for the policy of expediency ? 

That policy which, I repeat, has held its adherents to the 
superficial view of the American question, — to regard its incidents 
instead of piercing to its latent elements ; that — until a recent 
period — rested ostensibly and avowedly upon the course of events, 
but which, at the same time, assisted in shaping those events ; — ■ 
that policy which shuts the mouth of England so far as America is 
concerned, whenever Ireland or India awake from their lethargy ? 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



65 



Nay, — it was anything else than such a triumph ; and so much 
better was it, that we may mutually rejoice in it as affording by its 
wholesome lessons fresh safeguards of peace. — 

And, on the other hand, how — in the face of this temporising 
and vacillating policy, — has principle vindicated itself through 
the whole struggle ; — how, step by step, has all extraneous matter 
been eliminated by the sheer force of principle ; and how marked 
the moral lesson taught by the attitude of sublime patience main- 
tained by the suffering Operatives of Lancashire in spurning the 
temptation to outcry against the blockade of the Cotton ports. 

Mr. Editor, it has been well said that sympathy is the universal 
solvent. These men and women of toil are compelled by suffering 
to look beyond the surface. Finally, it was by this sheer force of 
principle that both, the sinister influences of the enemies of Ame- 
rica and the economic Colossus, that bestrides the three Islands 
with almost superhuman power, were overcome ; and it will be by 
the same force that the Rebels will be humbled in the dust, and 
not by the will of the Northern people, mighty as that is. 

Already, the " Richmond Whig " of December announces the 
retributive wave's flow, in declaring that " Slavery has stabbed 
itself to death ! " 

Let it be the glory of England as it is already the proper glory 
of many of her Sons, that she strove against this combined power 
of evil, — of private cupidity and of material interest, and conquered. 
— I am &c. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, 26th March, 1864. 



Editorial of the " Daily Press," of April 4th, 1864. 

We once knew a man who invariably prognosticated that 
every person introduced to him in the way of business was a sinis- 
ter looking rogue. It naturally eventuated that he was sometimes 
right, when he never failed to exclaim to his partner, " did I not 
tell you " &c. &c. ? 

Now on the same principle, our correspondent E. P. U., 
following the dictates and aspiration of his own mind, always cries 
" peace " to every squall that appears on the political horizon, and 
as he also must necessarily be sometimes right, he too lays claim 
to the gift of prophecy. 



66 



PAPERS ON THE 



Want of space prevents the possibility of our replying in full 
to E. P. U. in our present issue ; by way of paving the way for 
our reply we have two remarks to make ; one is that we repudiate 
in toto our correspondent's claim to the gift of prophecy, and by 
way of argument, for egotism is not one of our failings, we claim 
the gift ourself. The other remark is this : — We denounce E. P. 
U's. practice of clipping garbled extracts from the entire range 
of the Erench, English, and United States Press so as to suit his 
purpose and support his arguments. Why we will give it as our 
conviction that any idea, however impracticable, every argument 
however fallacious, any opinion however outrageous and absurd, 
may be supported by the same means. If E. P. U. only put for- 
ward snch garbled extracts as ideas, and supported them by his 
own arguments, his attachment to veracity would be developed to 
the same extent as his amor patrice ! But the plan he adopts is 
to lay down dogmas and then, giving one of these garbled clippings 
to support them, treat his argument as fully demonstrated, and 
go on to the next. 

So much in our present issue in reply to E. P. U. What 
follows below in pursuance of illustrating the above remarks, is 
so decidedly instructive, that we call on our readers to peruse it 
carefully. 



To the Editor of the " Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor. — A brief paragraph in your issue of this morn- 
ing seems to imply a slight ruffling of the surface of the hitherto 
placid estuary between us, — as though that dreaded " easterly 
swell " of the Atlantic, to which the politico-nautico observers of 
America now give the character of periodic, had been impelled to 
these seas by some agents of evil, intent upon cross purpose^ancl I 
hasten to pour upon the water so much oil as may, at least, disabuse 
your mind of the idea that you had offended me. 

Complete silence would have indicated that ; — but being im- 
pelled by, — on the one hand — a desire to impart my own convic- 
tions to neighbors whose regard I cherish, and — on the other — an 
unaffected indignation at the perversions of that portion of the press 
which may be said to form the staple of consumption in the foreign 
community, — I have so little regarded my individuality as to be- 
come committed to discussions which — in their public aspect — are 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



67 



distasteful to me. Moreover, I have had too many proofs of your 
editorial courtesy to permit a slight brusqueness of manner to be 
construed as intentional disrespect toward me. 

It is quite true, as I thought I had made clear in my letter 
of the 22nd, that your interjection of the 9th seemed untimely and 
that consequently — although I disregarded its form — I hesitated 
to proceed in the order of sequence, — since, as it indicated your 
disposition to offer comment in medio, you had absolved me from 
any strict observance of controversial rules, and it seemed that you 
might again, any day, interject — (to use your own figure) — a 
Clownish exclamation to startle " Eclipse " from the ring. 

You see, therefore, that the charge of causing interruption or 
delay rebounds upon yourself ; — in fact, Mr. Editor, you could 
hardly be in earnest, or you incautiously left the ring to pick up a 
loose stone outside, which — like the passing thought of a mental 
athlete — proves anything but effective as you grasp it. 

Against such weapons you will admit it is inglorious to contend, 
so that unless you again make a direct appeal to me upon matters 
having some connection with the root of our common ancestral — 
" Saxon " — tree, or effect so considerable a rally upon some position 
of your " Dannewerke " as shall recall me to a fresh encounter 
there, I shall refrain from tresspass upon your courtesy in future. 

But I am fain at this leave-taking, to ask you to give your 
readers an opportunity to judge of the conduct of those caterers 
who, like the conductors of the Times, consider " the truth too rare 
and good for human nature's daily food," by the following ex- 
tracts, * by way of specimen, from the London and New York 
papers by the last mail. — Remaining much obliged by your cour- 
tesv, Your Subscriber. 

E. P. U. 

Macao, March 28th, 1864. 



Mark the difference between truth and falsehood on a memo- 
rable occasion, both by correspondents of the Times. 

" The " Thunderer's " Correspondence. 

A few weeks ago, riots on election day and the interference 
of the military were predicted by the correspondent of the London 
Times. The fellow deemed it necessary to maintain what little 

* An important letter of the Correspondent of the London Daily News from New York, 
has been withheld by the Editor, as no doubt, too telling an exposure of the Times and of Manhattan. 



68 



PAPERS ON THE 



credit he possessed by sticking to his story. So on the 18th of 
October he wrote to the Times from New York about the election 
in Ohio three days before. He said : — 

" Mr. Lincoln and his advisers strained every nerve accord- 
ingly to organize or steal a victory. All the corrupt machinery of 
patronage and contracts was set to work in the cities, towns and 
rural districts of Ohio. " Greenbacks " were as the flowers of 
May, and to be had for the plucking by any man who would vote 
against Mr. Vallandigham. Soldiers and civilians were alike pressed 
into the cause ; and what the promises of place, money, or advance- 
ment could not purchase, the threats of the Provost Marshal were 
employed to extort!' 

The other correspondent was in Cincinnati on the day of elec- 
tion and out expecting to see a " row." He describes his innocent 
experiences as follows, in a letter dated October 14th. He 
says : 

" The election is over, and the public peace has not been for 
one moment disturbed. I walked from one polling shop to the 
other yesterday morning and evening, visiting all the seventeen 
wards of the city. A posse of from a dozen to a score of police- 
men were stationed at the door of each of these places ; but they 
sat down idle and listless, and all their task was limited to a little 
lazy chat and harmless chaff with some of the by-standers. I saw 
no crowd anywhere ; voters dropped in one by one, and interested 
persons on both sides, took care that the operations should be con- 
ducted in all fairness and legality. The public authorities nowhere 
interfered. I saw soldiers nowhere ; nowhere Irish bullies armed 
with formidable shillelaghs ; nowhere any attempt, I will not say to 
force, but even to solicit a vote. 

This last is the testimony of an eye witness who was rather 
disappointed at the absence of the expected disturbance. The 
first quotation is from a malignant penny-a-liner, who earns his 
pitiful wages by sending forward his regular budget of malice 
and misrepresentation. The one romances in his closet in New 
York, and swallows the marvellous tales of those whose willing 
dupe he is. The other makes his observations on the spot, and 
furnishes facts to balance the bold assertions and weak inventions 
of his co-laborer. The Times carries both loads, regardless of 
the truth of either, and anxious only to feed the flame of English 
prejudice and darken and confuse the brain of the bewildered 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



69 



Bull. The letters from which we have quoted appear in the 
Times of two successive days." 



Editorial of April 5th. 

We do think E. P. U. is hard to please. Is a public speaker 
ever heard in silence ? an advocate ever allowed to expatiate on 
the merits of his case, without marks of disapprobation from 
his antagonist ? Have we done more to E. P. U. ? We give up 
to him our columns with pleasure, but we think he goes too far 
in tonguetying us for weeks, and disseminating the while views 
to which he well knows we are entirely opposed. 

We desire to treat his present letter as the conclusion of his 
case. He clearly anticipates the castigation that awaits him. He 
may rely that his feelings will be treated with the same respect 
that he treats the feelings of others i. e. with the utmost respect 
and consideration. His views we shall combat heartily. 



To the Editor of the "Daily Press." 

Mr. Editor, — I claim the parliamentary right of interruption, 
accorded to public writers as to Speakers, to rebut your charge of 
yesterday that I have garbled extracts to suit my purposes and 
support my arguments ; and I call upon you to disclaim your in- 
sinuation that I have perverted the sense of the authors quoted, by 
now publishing the residue of each of the articles of which I had 
reserved portions, merely out of regard for the value of your space ; 
— a delicacy that your publication yesterday of the lengthy effusion 
of vulgar twaddle from the notorious " Manhattan "—(not an Ame- 
rican) — shews the misapplication of. 

You are certainly welcome to these several papers in their 
entirety ; and I am content to leave to the discriminating sense of 
your readers the question whether you or I have most observed 
the restraints of " veracity " in this case, — that is to say, whether 
I have in any sense or degree perverted the meaning of their authors 
to my own purposes by citing simply what sufficed to illustrate the 
immediate point in discussion in each instance, or whether you have 
again left the arena to pick up a loose stone outside, regardless of 
the dirt on it ? 



70 



PAPERS ON THE 



1. — The editorial of the London Economist of August 17th 
1861 : — I here annex the admirably reasoned introduction of the 
subject of the expediency policy of England, the resume of which, 
conveying the simple essence I used before as sufficient for illus- 
tration of my opinions (which by the bye I had published in 1860), 
and as will be seen with no purpose of perversion. 

HUNGARY AND ENGLAND 

fFrom the London Economist, August \7th, 1861 

"The Hungarian struggle has reached its crisis. Both 
Houses of the Diet have voted — the Upper House of Magnates 
unanimously, the Lower House with only about six dissentients — 
M. Deak's statesmanlike reply to the Emperor's rescript, and 
voted it without waiting to deliberate a single hour. The reply 
has now been published both in Hungary and in Germany. It is 
received in Pesth with the feverish delight of expectant martyrs 
waiting for the cruel consequences which they expect. It is re- 
ceived in Vienna with a howl of indignation that pure rebels — for 
so the Germans think the Hungarians — should venture to embody 
their rebellious resolutions in an address to the Crown. Nothing 
can be abler than the reply. M. Deak denies the fact that, since 
the publication of the Pragmatic sanction, the Hungarian nation 
has ever acquiesced in any but the personal union Math Austria, — 
that it has ever resigned for a moment its right to control taxation 
and the movements of its own Diet and Ministry. It declines 
absolutely to do so. Wj/ere it to recognise the Decrees of October 
and February last, summoning Hungary to send members to the 
Council of the Empire, it would abandon for ever its historical 
ground : — and for whom ? Eor one who has for the last ten years 
never hesitated at any breach of the Constitution which would 
serve his purpose. Such conduct would be madness. The Hun- 
garians, in their respectful but strong answer to the Emperor, 
simply say that they cannot and will not abandon their historical 
rights for any threat of suffering, — that for a time of great suffer- 
ing they are fully prepared, — but that the constitutional liberties 
of their country are not so exclusively the property of the present 
Diet or generation that they can venture to dispose of them. " If 
it be necessary to suffer," concludes this noble document, " the 
nation will suffer, in order to preserve for a later generation the 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



71 



constitutional freedom it inherits from its forefathers. It will 
suffer without despondency, even as its ancestors suffered and en- 
dured in defence of the rights of the country. For that which 
power and force take away, time and favourable circumstances 
may again restore, but the recovery of that which the nation itself 
out of fear of suffering should abandon, would ever be difficult 
and doubtful. The nation, then, will suffer with patience, hoping 
for a brighter future and confiding in the justice of its cause." 

These are words which ought to find an echo in every 
Englishman's breast ; but how does England receive them ? Lord 
Brougham and Mr. Roebuck have been already heard. From both 
of them came remarks on the value of the Austrian Empire, — on 
the necessity of supporting and strengthening it,- — on the noble 
course which the Emperor has pursued in granting representative 
institutions to the various provinces of the Empire, — and, by im- 
plication, obviously calling upon Hungary to submit. We must 
say we regard it as a reproach to England that her statesmen, — 
her liberal statesmen, — and her liberal members of Parliament, 
harp perpetually on this chord. Grant the full truth of it. Grant, 
for the sake of argument, that it may be truly desirable for Europe, 
—which we are not in fact at all prepared to admit, — to consolidate 
the different provinces of the Austrian Empire into a more perfect 
unity. Grant, too, — which is another inadmissible admission, — 
that the thing is feasible as well as desirable. What of this ? Is 
England really incapable of viewing the Hungarian question from 
any point of view but this of political expediency ? Is it absolutely 
beyond the possibility of our insular thought to consider what 
England would think it right to do in the same position, — whether 
she would sacrifice all her own historical liberties for considerations 
of European expediency and balance of power, — whether she would 
think for a moment of such matters or deem them worthy of any 
comparison with her duty to herself? And if, as we feel no doubt, 
England would be absolutely certain to claim a far higher impor- 
tance for her duty to herself than for any expediency considerations 
affecting Europe at large, — is it creditable to our statesmen that 
they are so utterly blind to the same considerations on behalf of 
Hungary, as not only to withhold every sign of English sympathy 
from a nation that is assuming towards the Emperor an attitude 
for which the only parallel is to be found in our own English his- 
tory, but also to say what is calculated, and perhaps even intended, 



72 



PAPERS ON THE 



to encourage Austria in her onslaught on Hungarian rights ? Lord 
Palmerston, Earl Russell, Mr. Gladstone, have each in succession 
taken pains to explain to Parliament, that while they regret to see 
Austria still in Venetia, they would regret to see any risk to her 
Empire North of the Alps, and that they hope the differences be- 
tween the Imperial Crown and Hungary may speedily be accom- 
modated, — a wish that can have but one meaning. What right 
we have thus to judge the most strictly constitutional and historical 
struggle of modern times on principles such as these, we are quite 
unable to see. The right of Italy to constitute herself into a great 
nation is morally valid ; but neither morally nor constitutionally 
is it near as indisputable as the right of Hungary to exact from 
the Crown the fulfilment of an express contract which every King 
of Hungary swears to fulfil." 

2. — The editorial of the London Daily News as to the inflam- 
matory conduct of the partisans of the South in England, at the 
period of the " Trent " affair ; and herein I think your readers 
will give me credit for a degree of moderation that the enemies 
of my Country do not shew, in withholding as I did, the most 
denunciatory portion of the justly indignant eloquence of the 
English Editor. 

" Had the Washington Cabinet pronounced itself in favour 
of Emancipation it would have received not only the sympathy, 
but enthusiastic support of Englishmen at large. But there is, 
as we have said, one striking exception to this unanimity of senti- 
ment. The feeling of the clubs, and of the more exclusive aristo- 
cratic circles, is notoriously in favour of the Slave States, and they 
have left no means untried to provoke war with the North, in 
order that the active help and assistance of this country may be 
secured for the South. This pro-slavery party have nothing but 
words of scorn, reproach, and detestation for the North. The 
leaders and representatives of the armed and violent Secession 
are " all honorable men." The pro-Slavery party watch their 
doings with eager interest, and wait with anxiety for the welcome 
news of their success. They commiserate the losses of the slave- 
holding South, and applaud with genuine enthusiasm the gallantry 
displayed by the heroic champions of the chain and the lash. 
These high-bred and educated sympathisers know, indeed, perfectly 
well that slavery lays the axe at the root of morality and religion ; 
but "their tender, sympathetic heart is superior to prejudice, 



AMERICAN QUESTION, 



73 



and never fails to recognise in a persecutor a friend and a brother." 
Manners are in their eyes of infinitely greater account than morals, 
and a gentlemanly air sufficient not only to cover a multitude 
of sins, but to atone for the open and flagrant violation of every 
precept in the Decalogue. They pratically accept the pointed 
definition which sharply defines the Southern aristocracy, " that 
he who steals his brother is a gentleman, and he who works for 
his living is not." It is true that the Southern party in this country 
have never yet openly defended Slavery. A weekly contemporary, 
who may perhaps fairly claim to speak on behalf of this party, 
seems, however, preparing to throw off this needless reserve. The 
Saturday Review contains an article the only meaning and moral 
of which is that Slavery is the best condition for the negro, is 
right in itself, and ought to be perpetuated. This is an advance 
in the right direction, that of outspoken honesty — and as such 
we give it a hearty welcome. The writer, it is true, considers 
Slavery in only one of its aspects — as it affects the negro himself ; 
but we must do him the justice to say that he deals fairly with 
this branch of the subject. He does not attempt in any way to 
conceal the brutalized condition to which Slavery reduces its vic- 
tims. But we are positively told that " the pressure of servitude 
blunts the moral sense of its victims to its degradation — the comforts 
of Slavery reconcile to its duration." His argument is, that whereas 
forced servitude keeps the negro brutalized and fat, while emanci- 
pation would probably make him enlightened and lean, Slavery is 
the better state and ought to be perpetuated. We commend the 
argument to the consideration of those who are disposed to believe 
that a high degree of intellectual cultivation is a necessary measure 
of ethical advancement either in the individual or the community." 

3. — The letter of Mr. Astor Bristed which I quoted the in- 
troductory paragraph of merely to shew how absurd was the fallacy 
of Mr. Seward's personal hostility to England ; and not as treating 
of the " Trent " affair, though the residue of it will now serve — 
thanks to your charge of garbling — to illustrate the general subject. 

" That our Premier should give signs of backing out at the first 
growl of the lion was nothing surprising. I fancy he always gets 
frightened when he finds himself in a tight place — that is to say, 
a place where something may have to be done beyond talking and 
writing. But what did astonish me — accustomed as I was in other 
days when I used to take the English side through thick and thin, 



74 



PAPERS ON THE 



to violent anti-English demonstrations on the most trivial grounds 
■ — Avas the general readiness to follow the Minister's lead. It is a 
striking illustration of the remark made in a former letter, how com- 
pletely the events of this year had taken all the spirit of braggadocio 
out of the people. Wherever I went (except among the ladies, 
who — it might be ungallant to say for want of knowledge — were 
far bolder than the men) it seemed to be agreed that we could not 
afford to have war with England on any terms, and must, therefore, 
submit to the British demands, however unjust or insolent. There 
was indeed a small minority who advocated bolder measures. They 
said the British Ministry, either from political or commercial ne- 
cessities, or ancient grudge, or all combined, had evidently for some 
time been resolved to pick a quarrel with us, that if they did not 
succeed in doing so on this occasion they would find some other, so 
that we should be only delaying our fate, not averting it ; that if the 
desperate alternative were presented annihilation was preferable to 
dishonour; but we had not yet come to this pass. Let our Go- 
vernment renounce its position of a man sparring with gloves on 
against another hitting as hard as he can with his h^st. Let us take 
our gloves off. In less than a month we can dispose of our enemies of 
the South. We have only to proclaim emancipation, and Savannah, 
Mobile, and New Orleans will share the fate of Charleston. Such 
cotton as we cannot lay hold of will be burnt. When the British 
ships arrive to " destroy the blockade," as the Times boasts, they 
will find the Southern cities destroyed, nothing to trade for, and 
nothing to repay them, unless, indeed, in accordance with the new 
lights which England seems to have received on the subject of 
slavery, they should seize and re-enslave the black. Meanwhile, 
we can put to sea 2,000 privateers, and do nearly as much injury to 
English commerce as their fleet can do ours. But these persons 
were a very small minority. The almost unanimous opinion was 
that we must make a virtue of necessity, and wait patiently until 
changed circumstances gave us or our children an opportunity of 
paying off the score. One thing is certain. However this Trent 
affair may be decided, such an accumulation of ill-feeling will re- 
main in the American mind that, should the present generation 
find no occasion of discharging it, it will be left as a bitter legacy 
to our children, I fear that the old traditional emity of Englishmen 
and Frenchmen will be pale and colourless in comparison of that 
fated to exist between Englishmen and Americans. You will 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



75 



please take notice that I write all this in complete ignorance of 
what the demands of your Government really were. Being merely 
a private individual, with no friends at head-quarters, I have no 
means of information beyond those open to the public in general 
— namely, the evening papers. Said papers came in while I was 
writing the prece/ding paragraph, and their tone inclines me to 
suspect that things are not quite so bad as they seemed, and that 
perhaps, after all, we wise men of Gotham may have been conjur- 
ing up some imaginary terrors against ourselves." — I am, etc., C. 
A. Bristed.— (Herald.) 

4. — As to the articles from the French papers, they were sent 
to you in the original print of Galignani's Messenger, in their entire 
state, and any appearance of " clipping " was caused, as in other 
cases, by the necessity to unite portions detached in the original 
printing by the bottom of columns being reached. 

Here ends my explanation and hence my right of interruption, 
which I have exercised with a sole regard to rectification. 

E. F. U. 

Macao, 5th\ April, 1864. 



P. S. Macao, May 30th, 1864. 

As yet no reply has been made by the Editor of "Daily Press" 
of Hongkong, so that I consider the discussion closed. — 

E. P. U. 

To the Editor of the " Daily Press," 
Hongkong. 

Macao, 1st June, 1865. 

Mr. Editor, — By the form in which you call attention to the 
communication upon American affairs in your issue of yesterday, 
you seem fain to ' damn with faint praise ' — as " a very beautifully 
written letter " — what in fact deserves to be considered a treatise 
upon the subject, — so complete is it as a popular, though concise, 
elucidation of the principles involved and evolved. 

" A word on the present crisis in America " is, it seems ' a 
word in season ' in this longitude, although ' the mind of the time ' 
is to a great extent educated up to the point of principle practically 



70 



PAPEllS ON THE 



reached in the American struggle. Long the blind led the blind ; 
— so long that believing Pilgrims had been way-worn and weary 
but for the stars of Faith and Hope that beckoned them on. 

That your Correspondent, although not an American, has been 
an attentive and intelligent observer of it from an early period is 
fully avouched by his well-digested^nd well-directed Avords ; and 
even at this, the eleventh horn', I welcome his advocacy and ac- 
knowledge his friendliness toward my country. 

In taking issue with him, you adhere to a line of argument 
that the logic of events should long since have driven you from ; 
and with what we can only characterize as the illogical incoherence 
of blind partisanship, you say that Slavery is wrong and yet claim 
for it the right to destroy my country's nationality to procure its 
own immunity from danger ! 

It suits you to ignore the aggressive nature of Slavery and 
hence to throw upon the North the responsibility of the War. — If 
your readers doubt the recklessly aggressive purposes of the Rebel 
leaders, the following few words of the Chief, Jefferson Davis, will 
remove it. 

In February, 1861, Mr. Davis, while engaged in "firing the 
Southern heart " by making inflammatory speeches all over the 
country, drew, in an address delivered at Stevenson, Alabama, and 
fully reported in the Southern newspapers, the following pleasing 
picture of what was to happen if the North made an attempt to 
resist secession by force : — 

"Your border States will gladly come into the Southern 
Confederacy within 60 days, as we will be their only friends. 
England will recognise us, and a glorious future is before us. The 
grass will grow in the Northern cities where the pavements have 
been worn by the tread of commerce. We will carry war where 
it is easy to advance, where food for the sword and torch await 
the armies in the densely populated cities." 

And if others hesitate to consider this declaration of purposes 
a natural enunciation of the aggressive principles of Slavery, I beg 
to refer them to the philosophical exposition of its nature and 
needs by the Honorable Mr. Spratt, one of its High Priests, quoted 
by me in April 1863 in a paper then printed, but which has not 
yet appeared in your columns, as follows : — 

a- The disquisition of the Hon. Mr. Spratt, although inspired 
from the extreme Southern point of view, forms no exception to 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



77 



the dispassionate tone which characterizes the other distinguished 
writers ; and is not only remarkable in this respect, but also as 
being the most elaborate attempt to justify Slavery and thence 
Secession, upon philosophical and economic grounds, — if it be not 
the sole respectable publication there, — that the tremendous issue 
has elicited. 

Indeed, the mind of the South has seemed spell-bound as if 
conscious of a moral paralysis, since the rupture of amicable 
relations. 

Writing in February 1861, Mr. Spratt ignored all question 
of armed resistance by the Free States ; — and assuming that the 
Slave Power stood unchallenged, save by the " moral sentiment of 
the World," he declares, truly, that " Slavery has been the vital 
agent of this great controversy ; the contest is not between the people 
of the North and the people of the South, for our relations have been 
pleasant and on neutral grounds there is still nothing to estrange us ; 
bid the real contest is between two forms of society ; " — and then pro- 
ceeds to make an urgent plea for the reopening of the Slave Trade, 
as a vital necessity of the existence of a Slave Republic or Empire. 

Inspired, or rather besotted, with this idea, he acids, — "I regard 
the Slave Trade as the test of its integrity : If that be rigid, then 
Slavery is rigid, but not without" and, further, records the prophecy, 
that the sure consequence of the inhibition of the Slave Trade will 
be "another Revolution" at the South. 

If, then, we accept Mr. Spratt as the exponent of the opinions 
of the Southern 4 ea l ers > — an d this is the only logical assumption 
of which the case, in its inherent features, is susceptible, — there is 
really no controversy remaining as to the origin of the struggle or 
the principles involved, nor any ground of presumption of a per- 
sonal hatred or irreconcilable sectional hostility. 

There is, simply, a question whether, on the part of the Nor- 
thern people, there is a firmly abiding faith in principles which shall 
give them sufficient tenacity of purpose to overcome the passionate 
but half-consciously-suicidal antagonism of their Southern Breth^n; 
— an antagonism hopeless of all save the glory of heroic devotion. 
— Hopeless, because they war against Nature, — against the princi- 
ple of progress avouched in all her works. Society must conform 
thereto, — has need to renew itself ; there is no standing still with 
Nations any more than with individuals ; — not to advance is to 
recede. 



78 



PAPERS ON THE 



The Southern leaders are attempting Revolution without jus- 
tification, for Revolution implies advancement, — the better conserv- 
ing the permanent good of the whole people ; whereas they purpose 
Revolution in the retrograde sense — in the interest of the few, — 
and such revolution has no moral sanction. It is, moreover, con- 
trary to the spirit of the time, and wholly repugnant to the genius 
of the American people. 

Can the result, then, of this struggle be doubtful? — Who 
can doubt that the ultimate result — whatever may be the impedi- 
ments thereto — will be a step in the path of the regeneration of 
that young and vigorous race that has peopled America 

Your Correspondent, writing somewhat in anticipation of the 
more recent and decisive triumphs of the Government forces, justly 
appealed to principles as the foundation of all society in expressing 
confidence in President Lincoln ; and both Mr. Davis, the Execu- 
tive Chief of the Rebellion and Mr. Spratt its Philosopher who, 
with their Coadjutors, stood so ready in 1861 to challenge the 
"moral sentiment of the World" now discover that it was too 
strong for them. 

You will have seen that I never doubted it would prove so. 

Yes ! — they defied it in vain ; but their implacable revenge 
has, nevertheless, sated itself on the vitals of the Nation ! 

Treason failed to rend the members, but it struck, at last, 
surely at the heart ! 

Your Correspondent was evidently not prepared for the last 
act of the drama, to which I here allude. lie had seen the South- 
ern leaders pursue the steady round of their suicidal career and 
when the circle was completed by that act of blind fatalism por- 
tending their defeat — the arming of their Slaves — he foresaw the 
end ; and hailed President Lincoln as the worthy successor of 
Washington. 

Little account did he take of that implacable hostility that is 
bred in the passionate Southern Slaveowner ; — little did he think 
that the laurel which he saw prepared for Lincoln's brow was to 
be displaced by the palm ! 

But, that the shock of this dark tragedy, violent as it was, 
was not wholly unexpected — that some such deed was apprehended 
— the following extract of a letter to a Friend at Hongkong dated 
May 24th 1865, will measurably shew. 

" I now turn to the latter portion of your letter, from which 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



I might well shrink, — so horrible are the sensations the subject of 
it awakens. 

Would to Heaven I could share your hope that these heart- 
rending tidings were but the conception of some heartless and 
desperate Stock-Gambler — a very lunatic's wild dream of a gainful 
lie, — fraught as they are, if true, with our country's bitter sorrow 
and its burning shame ! — But alas ! — I seem to see — only too 
vividly — in this stroke, fatal to our two most worthy co-workers in 
the salvation of our precious nationality, the diabolical impelling 
power emanating from that " Temple Infamous " at Richmond 
around which the most desperate of Traitors with canting hypo- 
crisy — impotent at length in battle — have conspired our humiliation 
and agonizing sorrow. — 

Well aimed, indeed, was the stroke to reach the very bottom 
of the Nation's great heart ! — 

Lincoln and Seward, — the Depositaries of their Country's 
fair fame abroad as at home and of its fortunes withal, — the two 
arms of the Nation and its co-working brain : — Ah ! — the devilish 
cunning that perceived all this — that demanded both lives as the 
complement of its fell purpose — -made these tidings true ! — 

Would that we could blot this page from our Country's his- 
tory — ? — No ! — it is but the culmination of the raging passion of 
years in the black heart of Treason. — Alas, that men so worthy 
are the Victims — that sacrifice so great was demanded of us ; but 
the more precious the Martyrs' blood, the more fructifying the 
Nation's future harvest. — 

We sow in sorrow, but to reap in joy. To the indelible in- 
famy of Treason is added the adhorrence of Treason's greatest 
crime. Hence, the public con^ience shall be invigorated, and the 
latent strength of an educated and virtuous People be aroused ; — 
hence, the Nation — chastened by its great sorrow — shall be pure- 
souled for ages ! " — 

I am, Mr. Editor, 

Your Subscriber, 



E. PLURIBUS UNUM. 



80 



PAPERS ON THE 



Q3) 



The views of the writer, as presented in the foregoing, pages 
were again enunciated upon the report of a special Mission in 
December 1865, as follows : — 



EXTRACT OF A CIRCULAR of the writer, of December 28^ 1865. 

" The general aspect of affairs continues peaceful and reassur- 
ing in Europe and the United States : — Tor, although the special 
mission * of the Honorable Mr. dishing to London avouches the 
serious appeal of the American to the British Government in be- 
half of the sufferers by the depredations of the Alabama in particular, 
it indicates rather a recourse to reasoning and deliberation — a trust 
in the moral sense of England — than anything savoring of impatience 
or peremptoriness : and we venture the prophecy that, so far from 
these claims resulting in estrangement between the two Countries, 
the discussions conducted by the eminent men who will act as 
commissioners in conjunction with Mr. Cushing will eventuate in 
a cordial reciprocal recognition of the rights and duties of the two 
Nations. 

Before this result is reached there may be some halting in the 
negotiations : but the moral sense of the two Peoples is coincident, 
— and, overbearing all obstacles, it will bring the discussions to 
the point of perfect concord." 

* This alludes to a rumour of that moment. 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



81 



POSTSCRIPT. 



August, 23rd 1869. 

In now printing a second edition of the foregoing Papers it 
seems worth while to note here the tendency of opinion in both 
England and America to the point originally made by the writer, 
distinguishing the case of the Alabama from the question of gene- 
ral liability. That this was the pre -requisite of a friendly settle- 
ment seems now conceded in both Countries. * The principle of 
responsibility thus recognized and its limits defined, it will, never- 
theless, be an obvious stroke of policy on the part of the Statesmen 
of England to waive the technical points as affecting the other 
cruisers by admitting at once that but for the success^ of the pro- 
jectors of the Alabama the most of them would not have been 
built ; and thus, by satisfying all the claimants alike, atone for the 
previous seeming reluctance to admit her liability. 

This is the princely way of restoring amity ; and it will carry 
with it a positive amelioration of intercourse between Nations, as 
a wholesome interpretation of international duties. — 

E. P. U. 

* Vide the annexed editorial of the Pall Mall Gazette. 



82 



PAPERS OX THE 



AN AMERICAN SUGGESTION. 

(Tall Mall Gazette, July o.J 

The Neic York World lately contained an article on the Ala- 
bama question which for several reasons deserves a more careful 
consideration from Englishmen than it is likely to obtain at this 
moment. In the first place we suspect that it embodies the views 
of the American Secretary of State. In so far as he is enabled to 
cam" out a policy of his own, that policy, we imagine, without 
any actual knowledge of the matter, will be found identical in its 
main outlines with that laid down in the World. In the next 
place, it is greatly to be desired that no proposal shall again be 
made on behalf of the United States which has not recommended 
itself, in the first instance, to the general sentiment of the country. 
As the article in question very truly says ; — " the controversy be- 
tween Great Britain and the United States has been so long, and 
of late so sharply, before the people that it is practically impossible 
for any scheme of adjustment to succeed which does not command 
the approbation of intelligent voters." The probable acceptance 
or rejection of such scheme by the English Government may have 
some influence in determining " intelligent voters " whether to 
give or to withhold the necessary approbation ; and therefore the 
frank discussion by English journals of any basis of negotiation 
which is proposed with any show of authority in their American 
contemporaries may help to supply, for the future, the knowledge 
which has been wanting in the past. Lastly, the suggestion before 
us deserves consideration on its merits. To give any opinion as 
to the manner in which it should be dealt with — supposing it to 
be actually made — by the British Government would obviously be 
premature ; but it is only fair to say that the proposal sketched 
out in the World is as different as possible from that put forward 
by Mr. Seward. "Whether the balance of argument shall turn out 
to be for or against it we are bound to admit that it is conceived 
with a statesmanship and moderation which has not of late charac- 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



S3 



terized the diplomatic dealings of the United States with this 
country. On all these grounds we think it well to give English 
readers a careful analysis of the article. 

The area of the dispute is narrowed at starting by a declara- 
tion that " to require from England an apology or atonement for 
conceding belligerent character to the Confederate States is unne- 
cessary, useless, and inadmissible." The accepted law of nations 
permits every sovereign State to decide for itself when a rebellion 
has attained such proportions as to be a Avar, and it is as far as 
possible from being the interest of the United States to narrow the 
liberty of action thus assured. That the English proclamation of 
neutrality was not in itself a lawful cause of offence is implied in 
the omission of the United States to make a precisely similar act 
a ground of complaint against France and Russia. The real grie- 
vance against England as compared with these Powers is that, 
while they maintained, she fell short of, the neutrality they professed 
in common. If the act of conceding belligerent rights to the South 
was innocent, it cannot, the World goes on to argue, be worth 
while to quarrel about the sentiments which inspired it. It does 
not become the United States to be over-sensitive on this point. 
A power which has any regard for its own dignity will be very 
tolerant of the sentiments which foreign Governments entertain or 
express regarding its acts, and this canon is especially applicable 
to a nation than which none " is more prone to make free com- 
ments, and so to indirectly take part in the political movements of 
other people." In support of this position the World quotes a 
reply of Mr. Webster to an Austrian remonstrance against certain 
acts of an American agent in Hungary in 1 849, which are very much 
to the purpose. " While performing with strict fidelity all their 
neutral duties, nothing will deter the Government or the people of 
the United States from exercising at their own discretion the rights 
belonging to them as an independent nation, and from forming 
and expressing their own opinions, freely and at all times, upon 
the great political events which may transpire among the civilized 
nations of the earth." It will be seen that if this principle be 
fairly applied, a great number of the complaints which have been 
brought against England in the United States are deprived of all 
foundation. There were many Englishmen of both political parties 
who formed and expressed opinions favourable to the South, but, 
in so doing, they in no way went beyond the liberty which Mr. 



84 



PAPERS ON THE 



Webster rightly claims on behalf of his own countrymen. If, 
therefore, the articles goes on, neither the act of conceding belli- 
gerent status to the Confederate States, nor the motives which 
prompted that act, constitute a fair ground of complaint against 
England, " it would be profitless to complain that ocean belligerency 
was not withheld, or to dispute as to the precise character to be 
attributed to the blockade proclaimed by Mr. Lincoln. There 
may be matters for reciprocal municipal legislation hereafter ; they 
have nothing to do with the question now in dispute between the 
two countries." 

By this process the World arrives at the conclusion that the 
only right the United States have against the British Government 
is one arising out of the very act which has been so ignorantly 
attacked by many Americans. It is a right " to hold the British 
Government to a punctual fulfilment of all the obligations of the 
' strict and impartial neutrality ' which the Queen professed on May 
13, 1861. These obligations were voluntarily assumed by Great 
Britain, and in the spirit of national honour and self-respect she 
cannot and will not refuse to accept as the measure of her duty 
therein the rules which anterior to that date her own courts and 
publicists laid down as the necessary and indisputable incidents of 
neutrality ; and if she intentionally or unintentionally violated those 
rules, whereby the Government or citizens of the United States 
suffered losses which would not have occurred if those rules had 
been respected, she cannot and will not withhold an expression of 
her regret, and an admission of her liability, nor be unwilling to 
make due atonement and pecuniary reparation." The World then 
enumerates the various acts which the proclamation of the 18th of 
May declared to be violation^ neutrality, and defines the precise 
question between the two countries to be whether " the Queen's 
Ministers and other officers exerted with due efficiency all the 
power of her Majesty to repress the undertaking of any or all of 
these unlawful acts." The World does not believe that " there is 
any member of the Ministry or of either House of Parliament who 
if put upon his responsibility as a judge or an arbitrator between 
the two nations would say that in respect to the Alabama the 
Queen's officers punctually and fully did their duty," and whether 
this be so or not it is sure that " the people of the United States 
can never on the admitted facts be made to believe that," in deal- 
ing with the Alabama, " there was not intentional wilful negligence 



AMERICAN QUESTION. 



85 



on the part of the Customs authorities, a languor of action on the 
part of the Crown law officers, for which the English Government, 
acknowledging its regret and responsibility, should promptly make 
due pecuniary reparation." A case, the facts of which are so clear 
and undisputed, is not, in the opinion of the World, a fit subject 
for arbitration. As regards the other cruisers, the evidence of 
neglect is not so perfect ; but so far as the Alabama is concerned, 
the people of the United States will never approve a settlement 
"which is not preceded by an expression on the part of England 
in some customary form of diplomacy — such for example, as in a 
diplomatic communication consenting to reopen negotiations — of 
her regret for the occurrences, her willingness to make due atone- 
ment for the injury done to the nation, and pecuniary reparation for 
the losses of individuals. This done in respect to the Alabama, the 
question of English responsibility for the outfit, escape, and career 
of the other cruisers, together with the measure of damage actual- 
ly suffered on account of the Alabama as well as the other cruisers, 
can be submitted to the decision of a commission constituted as 
to the high contracting parties may seem best." The distinction 
between such a proposal as is here indicated and that lately made 
by Mr. Revercly Johnson is, on the one hand, the omission of any 
claim upon England for apology or reparation " on account of bel- 
ligerent recognition per se," and on the other hand the stipulation 
that the British Government shall acknowledge, without any pre- 
liminary reference to arbitration, its liability for the depredations 
of the Alabama. The last condition, says the World, " is the one 
point on which the judgment of the American people is clear and. 
settled ; on which their demand for redress is imperative and un- 
compromising. If Great Britain does not owe us reparation for 
the ravages of the Alabama then we have no shadow of a case, and 
have been urging captions demands. We, of course, shall never 
admit, not even as the result of the award of arbitrators, that the 
keen sense of injury under which the nation lias so long been 
smarting had no solid foundation. We cannot consent to regard 
the responsibility of England for .the escape of the Alabama as a, 
doubtful question, and if she insists on treating it as such any 
further negotiations with her would be idle and futile." The prin- 
ciple involved in the Alabama claims " cannot be submitted to the 
decision of Commissioners ; it must be prescribed to them as the 
rule to guide their judgment in awarding damages to claimants. 



S6 



PAPERS ON THE 



Whether any particular claim is covered by the principle is a proper 
question for the Commissioners, as well as the amount of damages ; 
but the general question of liability must be settled by a concession 
on the part of England." 




